City of York Council (20 013 136)
Category : Benefits and tax > Council tax
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 20 Apr 2021
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: Ms X complains that the Council unfairly issued a summons for unpaid council tax to her. We will not investigate this complaint because there is insufficient injustice to warrant investigation.
The complaint
- Ms X complains that the Council unfairly issued a summons for unpaid council tax to her.
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, or
- the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
- the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(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 commented on the draft decision.
What I found
- Ms X says that she bought a second home to rent out in November 2019 and notified the Council of her address. A tenant took occupation in January 2020 but the Council issued a bill for £74 unpaid council tax to her rental address which she did not see until November 2020 (after which a summons had been issued). The summons added £65 costs to the bill. Ms X argues the Council’s council tax department was at fault for not writing to her residential address.
- The Ombudsman will only investigate a complaint where there is significant personal injustice that would warrant such action. I am not satisfied that there is sufficient injustice to do so in this case.
Final decision
- I do not intend to investigate this complaint because there is insufficient injustice to warrant investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman