City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council (25 014 654)
Category : Benefits and tax > Council tax
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 03 Feb 2026
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a council tax premium. This is because the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
The complaint
- Ms X complains the Council incorrectly charged a council tax premium for an empty property. She also says the Council delayed and failed to respond properly to her queries. This caused her financial and emotional stress.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- 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 (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B)).
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council. I also considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- Ms X complained to the Council regarding the matters in paragraph 1.
- The Council replied that it had
- correctly applied the premium initially due to information it received about the property being furnished.
- agreed there was some delay on its part, and it could have asked for further information earlier to clarify Ms X’s response. It apologised for this and said it had provided feedback to the officer.
- Since removed the premium as Ms X had provided further evidence.
- We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because the injustice due to the Council’s delay and its fault in not requesting further clarification is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
- There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in its initial decision to apply a premium to warrant investigation. The Council made its decision based on the information it had received.
Final decision
- We will not investigate this complaint because the injustice to Ms X is not significant enough to warrant investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman