London Borough of Tower Hamlets (19 009 711)
Category : Benefits and tax > Council tax
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 04 Mar 2020
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: Mrs X complains that the Council has not recorded all her payments of Council tax and has demanded a higher payment of Council tax to clear arrears than she can afford. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint because there is no evidence of fault by the Council.
The complaint
- Mrs X complains that the Council has not recorded all her payments of Council tax and has demanded a higher payment of Council tax to clear arrears than she can afford.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:
- it is unlikely we would find fault.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
- I have considered the comments of the complainant and the Council and the complainant has had an opportunity to comment on the draft decision.,
What I found
- Mrs X says that she had to move to her temporary flat for a year and a half following a fire. She says that she made three payments towards her Council tax bill whilst she was there. She complained in November 2018 that the Council has not accepted and credited her with these payments.
- The Council says that, as Mrs X accepted that she had made payments to a different account in error, that it would need more details of the payments before it could adjust her account. It says that she provided this information in November 2019.
- I am satisfied that the Council’s request for supporting evidence to enable it to credit Mrs X with the payments is not fault. There was delay in providing that evidence but I do not consider that to be fault by the Council.
- I note that the Council has now reviewed her payments following consideration of her income and expenditure information and a reduced offer was made for her repayments.
- In the absence of procedural fault, it is not for the Ombudsman to question the merits of the Council‘s actions.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman