Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint concerning matters from April 2018. This is because the complaint has been made late and there are no good reasons for us to exercise discretion and investigate now.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I shall refer to as Mr X, says he would like compensation for a council error from April 2018. He says the Council used his late father’s name to redirect mail to the Council from his address despite his father never having lived with him.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered the information Mr X provided with his complaint and the Council’s responses. I shared my draft decision with him and read his response.

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What I found

4. It seems Mr X’s complaint has been made in the context of the Council having legal authority to manage his late father’s finances via the Court of Protection. He is particularly unhappy about an issue relating to his late father’s mail being redirected. He says he received a card from Royal Mail in 2018 saying his father’s mail was being redirected to the Council but says his father never lived at his address.
5. The Council responded to his complaint in May 2019 to say it is too late to investigate under its complaints investigation procedure. But it answered his complaint by including a copy of an email it sent Mr X in April 2018 about this issue. In this email, a Council officer says it has contacted Royal Mail to clarify what happened and Royal Mail has apologised for its error.
6. My final decision is there are no good reasons for the Ombudsman to exercise discretion to investigate Mr X’s complaint now. This is because he is raising a matter from April 2018 – well over a year after he became aware of it - so it is also too late for the Ombudsman to investigate. I have considered if there are any good reasons to exercise discretion but do not see any. This is because the matter seems to concern matters that are the responsibility of the Royal Mail. And, also because, the Council had legal authority over Mr X’s late father’s financial affairs and the mail redirection issue seems to have arisen within this context.

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Final decision

7. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because Mr X has complained late and there is no good reason for us to exercise discretion to investigate now.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman