Summary: A man complained that the Council wrongly sent him a summons for council tax arrears which related to someone else with the same name, and failed to respond to his complaint about this matter. But we do not have grounds to start an investigation of this complaint because the Council has already offered a suitable remedy for what went wrong.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I shall call Mr X, complained that the Council sent him a bill for council tax and a summons for council tax arrears relating to someone with the same name but a different address. Mr X also complained that the Council failed to reply to his complaint about this matter. Mr X said as a result he was caused unnecessary stress as he was worried that bailiffs might call at his property and that his credit rating could be affected.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 an investigation if, for example, we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered the information Mr X provided with his complaint. I also gave Mr X an opportunity to comment on a draft of this decision before I reached a final view in his case. In addition, I took account of the Council’s responses to my enquiries and its correspondence with Mr X about his complaint.

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What I found

4. Mr X received a council tax bill from the Council which was in his name but related to a different address. Mr X said he returned the letter to the Council the same day.
5. A couple of months afterwards Mr X received a summons for unpaid council tax which again was in his name but related to the other address. Later that day Mr X made a complaint to the Council.
6. Two days after that the Council emailed Mr X saying its complaints service would investigate and respond. But after waiting four months without hearing from the Council Mr X complained to us.
7. Following our enquiries it emerged that the Council had, in fact, sent Mr X a complaint response the same day it had emailed him to acknowledge his complaint. However when sending the response the Council made a mistake regarding Mr X’s email address, which meant he did not receive it at the time.
8. In its complaint response the Council acknowledged its error in sending Mr X the council tax bill and summons, which were intended for another person with the same name as him. The Council confirmed that Mr X’s liability for the other address had been withdrawn along with the summons and related costs. The Council also assured Mr X that there were no implications for his credit rating, and it offered him a payment of £50 as a goodwill gesture.
9. Following our intervention the Council re-sent its complaint response to Mr X to his correct email address with an apology for getting his email wrong. But by then it was six months after the response was originally issued.
10. In the circumstances we asked the Council to also review its compensation offer in Mr X’s case to take account of its mistake regarding his email address which led to the delay in him receiving its first response. The Council subsequently agreed to increase its compensation offer to £100.

Analysis

11. The Council has acknowledged it was at fault in Mr X’s case by wrongly sending him a council tax bill and a summons for council tax arrears which should have gone to another taxpayer with the same name. In addition it used an incorrect email address when responding to Mr X’s complaint, which meant he was unaware of the response until several months later.
12. I have no reason to doubt that Mr X was caused some unnecessary concern and stress as a result of this fault. However, I consider that the Council has now taken appropriate steps to remedy what went wrong in his case. In particular it has corrected its billing and email errors, apologised to Mr X and offered him some compensation to mark the injustice he was caused.
13. In addition the Council has committed to reviewing its processes for finding forwarding addresses of council taxpayers who have moved, and the data protection implications of those processes.
14. In the circumstances I consider we now have no reason to start an investigation of Mr X’s complaint. In particular it is unlikely we could add to what the Council has already done to put matters right, or could justify recommending any further remedy in his case.

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Final decision

15. We do not have reason to investigate Mr X’s complaint that the Council wrongly sent him demands for council tax which related to another person and then failed to respond to his complaint about this matter. This is because the Council has already taken suitable action to remedy matters in Mr X’s case and we are unlikely to achieve a better outcome than that.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman