Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about housing benefit overpayments because it is reasonable to expect her to appeal to the Tribunal.

The complaint

1. Ms X says the Council has wrongly calculated her housing benefit.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
3. The Social Entitlement Chamber (also known as the Social Security Appeal Tribunal) is a tribunal that considers housing benefit appeals. (The Social Entitlement Chamber of the First Tier Tribunal)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by Ms X which included the Council’s reply to her.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Ms X says she wrote to the Council in March 2023 about its claim she had been overpaid housing benefit. Ms X has provided a letter from the Council from May 2024 which shows it has reassessed her housing benefit and sets out what it believes she has been overpaid.
7. Housing Benefit helps eligible people on low incomes pay their rent and the Council manages and pays this. The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 (the Regulations) set out the rules councils must follow for calculating and paying Housing Benefit.
8. If a council pays too much housing benefit to someone, it will usually ask them to repay it. The law says the council can recover overpayment unless it was caused by an official error and it was not reasonable to expect the person to realise they were receiving too much benefit.
9. If someone disagrees with a decision that they must repay an overpayment they can appeal to the Tribunal. The law says people should appeal within one month of the date of the decision they think is wrong. The Tribunal can accept a late appeal up to 13 months from the date of the decision. Because of this opportunity for appeal, we would not normally investigate complaints about these decisions.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because it is reasonable to expect her to appeal to the Tribunal.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman