Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about council tax handling and a Subject Access Request. This is because the Council has taken appropriate action to remedy its error and there is not enough evidence of fault in other matters. We cannot investigate court proceedings, and it is reasonable to expect the complainant to refer to the Information Commissioner about her Subject Access Request.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains the Council has failed to handle her council tax account fairly and transparently. Enforcement action continued while she was requesting clarification and evidence regarding the court summons process. The Council’s SAR response did not supply adequate information. The Council delayed responding at stage two, and it was not an independent response.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions an organisation has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)
4. We cannot investigate a complaint about the start of court action or what happened in court. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5/5A, paragraph 1/3, as amended).
5. 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 injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint, (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B)).
6. We normally expect someone to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner if they have a complaint about data protection. However, we may decide to investigate if we think there are good reasons. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended).
7. We will not usually investigate complaint handling if we are not investigating the rest of the complaint. This is because there is not usually enough injustice to justify us doing so. We collect information about particularly poor complaint handling practice and report this back to organisations. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), section 34B(8)).

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How I considered this complaint

8. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council. I also considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

9. Ms X complained to the Council regarding the matters in paragraph 1.
10. The Council accepted it had promised in May 2025 to hold recovery for six weeks. But it did not hold recovery action. It issued a summons and a liability order was granted. It passed the account to its enforcement agent. The Council apologised and withdrew the account from its agent and cancelled the summons and costs.
11. We will not investigate the Council’s error in not holding recovery action, because it has taken suitable action to remedy the injustice due to its fault. If we were to investigate, this is the remedy we would recommend, and we would not make further recommendations.
12. The Council said it had responded regarding the summons process and explained it had followed the statutory process correctly.
13. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint regarding the summons and liability order process and the Council’s explanations. This is because we cannot investigate the issue of the summons or the liability order because these are court proceedings. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s explanations to warrant investigation.
14. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about the Council’s SAR response which she considered inadequate. This is because it is reasonable to expect her to refer to the Information Commissioner and this is the appropriate body to consider such complaints.
15. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about complaint handling for the reasons set out in paragraph 7. It is unlikely that there is significant injustice that warrants our involvement.

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Final decision

16. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because the Council has provided a suitable remedy for its faults. We will not or cannot investigate other parts of Ms X’s complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman