Summary: Mr X complains the Council did not notify him before suspending his tenant’s housing benefit payments. The Ombudsman will not investigate the complaint as any injustice sustained has been caused by the actions of the tenant rather than the Council. The matter is also out of time.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I will refer to as Mr X, says the Council should have checked with him before stopping housing benefit payments claimed by his tenant.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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)
3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I have considered Mr X’s letter of complaint, the correspondence shared between Mr X and the Council and the Council’s final complaint response.
6. Mr X has made comments on the draft decision, which have been taken into account.

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What I found

7. Mr X is a landlord. In February 2017, his tenant stopped paying rent and told Mr X the Council had stopped his housing benefit.
8. Mr X contacted the Council to check this was true. The Council would not discuss the matter with him because of data protection restrictions.
9. Mr X phoned the Council and sent a letter stating his tenant was over 8 weeks in rent arrears. The Council now had a legal duty to redirect the tenant’s housing benefit to Mr X (unless it was in the overriding interests of the tenant not to do so) and commenced payment to Mr X.
10. Mr X’s tenant told the Council he left the property in September 2017, so the Council stopped making payments to Mr X and confirmed this to Mr X a month later. However, Mr X says his tenant told him he would not leave the property until November 2017. Mr X was upset the Council had taken this action, as he felt he should have received a further four week’s housing benefit.
11. Several weeks later the Council responded, saying it would be unable to pay any further housing benefit until the tenant had applied for it. The Council also recommended that Mr X seek legal advice.
12. Mr X wrote to the Council, indicating he would accept four week’s housing benefit in resolution to the matter. The Council did not respond to Mr X so he wrote another letter requesting an update.
13. The Council confirmed it would be unable to pay further housing benefit to Mr X, as his tenant had not applied for it. At this point, Mr X referred the complaint to us.

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Analysis

14. It is unlikely the Ombudsman would find fault with the Council’s decision not to discuss the tenant’s housing benefit with him when he first contacted it. Housing benefit is a matter between the Council and the tenant unless the tenant is over
    8 weeks in rent arrears.
15. After Mr X provided evidence the tenant was over 8 weeks in arrears,
    I consider the Council took the appropriate action when it began making the payments directly to him.
16. I understand the bulk of Mr X’s complaint relates to the Council’s decision to take the tenant at his word and suspend his housing benefit when he asked it to. This is not fault.
17. The Council could not arrange payment to Mr X unless the tenant applied for housing benefit. The Council sent the tenant the necessary forms to arrange this, but the tenant did not complete these forms. I cannot fault the Council for the tenant’s inaction. If Mr X remains unhappy with arrears on the account, he needs to pursue this with his tenant rather than the Council.
18. Were the Ombudsman to be critical of the Council’s failure to respond promptly to Mr X’s concerns, I do not think this would not lead to a significant outcome for Mr X as the injustice this caused is minimal.
19. Whilst I note the time taken by the Council to respond to Mr X’s complaint, I see no reason why the complaint could not have been made to this office within 12 months of the matter arising in September 2017. The complaint is therefore out of time.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman