London Borough of Southwark (23 000 190)
Category : Benefits and tax > Housing benefit and council tax benefit
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 04 May 2023
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council claiming Mrs X owed it £15.95. There is not enough injustice to Mrs X.
The complaint
- Mrs X complains the Council wrongly deducted £15.95 from her housing benefit account after saying she did not owe the amount. She says this caused her stress and she incurred travel and legal costs.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- The Council at first told Mrs X it had overpaid her housing benefit by £610.60, which she should repay. Mrs X challenged the Council. The Council says it then reduced the overpayment to £15.95. Mrs X disputes that, citing a letter from the Council saying her balance had been reduced to nil.
- The central substantive dispute is about only £15.95. That does not amount to enough injustice to Mrs X to justify the Ombudsman investigating. Mrs X says the matter has also caused to incur travel and legal advice costs and she has suffered stress. It was Mrs X’s choice how much effort and expense to devote to a dispute about £15.95. While I appreciate there has been some impact on Mrs X, in all the circumstances it would be disproportionate for the Ombudsman to devote time and public money to investigating whether the Council was at fault.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is not enough injustice to Mrs X and it would be disproportionate to pursue a complaint where the main dispute is about £15.95.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman