Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about Council tax exemptions because there is no evidence of fault, there was a right of appeal to a tribunal and the matter is out of time.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains that the Council did not properly take into account her son’s student status.

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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)
3. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal 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 appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
4. The Valuation Tribunal deals with appeals against decisions on council tax liability and council tax support or reduction.
5. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in the decision making, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
7. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

8. Ms X says that she sent the Council a copy of her son’s Council tax exemption certificate in 2021 but this was not properly considered and added to the bill. As a result she says she is facing significant enforcement costs from bailiffs.
9. The Council says that the decision regarding student status was given to her in October 2021 and was for the period October 2021 to September 2022. Any dispute about this (and later amendments in 2023) could have been appealed to a Valuation Tribunal. The tribunal is an expert body and their decisions are binding on the Council. I see no reason why an appeal could not be made in this case.
10. Further, any dispute about decisions made in 2021 are out of time (and thus out of jurisdiction) as they could reasonably have been made to this office within 12 months.
11. The Council have provided a detailed chronology to show that enforcement was taken because of late and non payments of Council tax. The Council’s use of bailiffs to enforce the debt is not therefore the result of fault by the Council.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because there was a right of appeal to a tribunal, the matter is late and there is no evidence of fault by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman