Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about council tax recovery action. We could not achieve much more on some parts of the complaint. It would be disproportionate to investigate other parts. It is reasonable to expect Miss X to take court action on the point about the effect on her health.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains about how the Council has pursued her for payment of a council tax debt from a previous address for a period in 2018. She says this has caused distress, worry about financial difficulties and affected her health.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)
3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by the complainant and copy correspondence from the Council. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Most of the actions complained of happened after the Council contacted Miss X at her current address earlier this year. Miss X argues the Council should have traced her new address sooner from information it already had. If that had happened, Miss X would simply have known sooner that the Council wanted payment of the same amount. Given the pressure on the Ombudsman’s resources, it would be disproportionate to pursue this point.
6. Miss X says the Council’s actions worsened her physical and mental health, including causing seizures, panic attacks and suicidal thoughts. Part of the result she wants from this complaint is a reduction of the council tax debt to reflect the alleged health impact. The alleged effect on Miss X’s health is really a claim of personal injury. The courts can consider that, so the restriction in paragraph 3 applies to this point. The possible cost of court action does not in itself automatically mean the Ombudsman should investigate instead. Liability for personal injury is not straightforward legally. It is more appropriate for the courts than the Ombudsman to decide this. So it would be reasonable for Miss X to go to court for a decision on whether the Council’s actions damaged her health.
7. When Miss X complained to us, she wanted the Council to add a marker to its records regarding her vulnerability. The Council has now done that. We could not achieve significantly more on this point.
8. Miss X states the Council did not previously consider her vulnerability properly in how it dealt with her, including in communications about recovery action from the Council and involving enforcement agents. If there was any fault here, it might have caused Miss X distress until the Council added the vulnerability marker more recently. However, in all the circumstances, I am not persuaded the impact of any fault in the earlier events is significant enough to warrant the Ombudsman devoting time and our limited public money to investigating whether there was any fault by the Council here.
9. Miss X wants the Council to do a financial assessment and take account of her circumstances so she can repay the debt in affordable instalments. The Council’s responses to Miss X at the first and second stages of its complaint procedure invited Miss X to put forward a repayment proposal. That seems appropriate, at least as a first step in coming to an arrangement. Miss X can reasonably put a proposal to the Council, which can include any explanatory information about her financial and other circumstances. It is unlikely we could achieve significantly more than that by investigating the complaint.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint. Some of what Miss X wanted to happen has now happened and it is unlikely we could achieve significantly more on those points. Other points do not cause significant enough injustice to warrant investigation. On the point about alleged damage to Miss X’s health, it would be reasonable to expect Miss X to take court action.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman