Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the amount of council tax the Council charged on his empty and unfurnished property. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains about the amount of council tax the Council charged on his empty and unfurnished property. He asked for a discount and says the Council gave an inadequate response and did not properly consider his request.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Mr X.
4. I also considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X asked the Council to discount the council tax on his empty and unfurnished property. He said a discount should apply as the property was not using council services, was on the market for sale, and he believed charging the full amount after the first month was against the spirit of the law.

Council tax

6. Councils can charge council tax on empty and unfurnished homes. Council tax is not a contract or payment for specific services. It is simply a tax to be paid in accordance with the law. Councils may offer discounts for empty homes, but the level and duration of any discount is a matter for each council to decide. Any challenge to a council’s discount scheme can only be made by judicial review (Section 11A of the Local Government Act 1992 as amended). So we cannot consider whether the Council’s policy should be different.
7. The Council’s policy says that an empty and unfurnished home can receive a 50 per cent discount for the first month. After this, the full charge applies. The evidence I have seen shows the Council charged Mr X’s property in accordance with its policy. There is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council applied the law or its policy to justify us investigating. Mr X’s view about the spirit of the law is a matter of legal interpretation, which only the courts can decide.
8. Councils also have discretion to reduce the council tax payable on a property through their discretionary relief schemes. The evidence I have seen shows the Council told Mr X about this option in its first response to his complaint. From that point onwards, Mr X had the option to apply for the discount, regardless of whether he thought the Council was responding to his complaints properly. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council, or resulting injustice to Mr X, to justify us investigating this point.

Complaint handling

9. I acknowledge the Council did not respond to every point Mr X raised in his complaint. However, we do not investigate complaint handling in isolation when we are not investigating the substantive issue. As we are not investigating the Council’s decision about how much council tax to charge, it would not be a good use of public resources to investigate the complaint handling aspect of Mr X’s complaint.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint. There is not enough evidence of fault causing significant injustice in the council tax charges. We cannot consider whether the Council should have a different discount policy for empty unfurnished properties. It is not a good use of public resources to investigate the complaint handling in isolation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman