Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s administration of Miss X’s council tax account as part it is made late to us and there are not good reasons to investigate now. We will not investigate the second part of Miss X’s complaint as this has not yet been made to the Council.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains the Council:
1. sent her a threatening letter in June 2023 saying it would remove her single person council tax discount if she did not contact it within 21 days,
2. did not give her a two-month break in instalment payment for the tax year 2023/2024,
3. Did not notify her of missed payments which resulted in increased instalments from October 2023 to April 2024,
4. Failed to respond to two complaint letters she had hand delivered to the Council, and
5. Changed her instalment payments for November 2024 through to March 2025 despite Miss X having asked it not to do this,
2. Miss X says she found the Council’s actions to be aggressive and intimidating, forced her to make several visits to her bank and caused her problems with her telephone banking. Miss X says this has caused her financial hardship, emotional distress and has affected her health.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. The law says that, before investigating a complaint, we must normally be satisfied the Council has had an opportunity to investigate and reply.

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

7. Documents Miss X provided to us indicate she was aware of the issues in complaints a) and b) in mid-2023 and complaint c) in October 2023. Miss X does not specify the dates of when she says she hand delivered complaints to the Council, but it seems this was around September/October 2023.
8. As Miss X did not complain to us until December 2024, her complaint about these issues is made late, as per paragraph three. It is reasonable to expect Miss X to have complained to us within a year of her knowing about the problems and as such, I do not consider there are good reasons to investigate now.
9. There is no indication that Miss X has complained to the Council about changes to her instalments from November 2024. As per paragraph four, Miss X must make this complaint to the Council before we would assess it.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because part is made late, and part has not been made to the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman