Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision about the complainant’s housing benefit entitlement. This is because most of the complaint is late and there are no good reasons to investigate. In any case it was reasonable to expect the complainant to use their legal right to appeal to the specialist Social Entitlement Tribunal.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council wrongly applied non-dependant deductions to his Housing Benefit from 2007 to the present date.
2. Mr X says his children should not have been treated as non-dependants for Housing Benefit purposes because they were not living with him as non-dependants with assessable income.
3. Mr X seeks a recalculation of Housing Benefit, repayment of all deductions dating back to 2007, compensation, and an admission of fault by the Council.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
5. 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)
6. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended).
7. The Social Entitlement Chamber (also known as the Social Security Appeal Tribunal) is a tribunal that considers housing benefit appeals. (The Social Entitlement Chamber of the First-Tier Tribunal).

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How I considered this complaint

8. I considered information provided by the complainant.
9. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

10. We will not investigate as most of this complaint concerns matters that occurred many years before the complaint was raised to us. We do not normally investigate matters raised outside the 12‑month time restriction on our powers, and I can see no good reasons to investigate. Mr X was aware of the deductions as they were being made, and he could have raised his complaint to us earlier than this year.
11. In any case, decisions about housing benefit entitlement, including deductions carry legal appeal rights to the Social Entitlement Chamber. Parliament has provided this specialist appeal route to decide if benefit calculations and deductions have been applied correctly. We usually expect complainants to use their specialist appeal rights.  
12. From the evidence I have seen, most of Mr X’s complaint is late and there are no good reasons to investigate now. Also, it would have been reasonable for X to appeal to the Social Entitlement Chamber so we will not investigate.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because it is late and there are no good reasons to investigate. Also, it would have been reasonable to expect Mr X to use his right to appeal to the Social Entitlement Chamber.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman