Summary: We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about a housing benefit overpayment. This is because it was reasonable for Miss X to use her right of appeal.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Miss X, complained about the Council’s handling of her housing benefit. Miss X says the Council wrongly managed her account leading to an overpayment. Miss X is unhappy with the way the Council has pursued this. Miss X is unhappy with the Council’s response to her complaint and the length of time she has been trying to resolve this issue.

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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’, 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 another body better placed to consider this complaint. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
4. 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)
5. 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). I refer to it as the Tribunal in this decision statement.
6. It is not a good use of public resources to investigate complaints about complaint procedures, if we are unable to deal with the substantive issue.

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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered information provided by the complainant.
8. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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What I found

Background

9. Miss X complained to the Council in September 2022 about its handling of her housing benefit. Miss X said the Council had wrongly allowed an overpayment to accrue.
10. The Council responded to Miss X. It gave her the right to escalate her complaint and to appeal to the Tribunal. Miss X submitted a further complaint in April 2023 via the Mayor. The Council provided a copy of its previous response. Miss X also contacted the Ombudsman, and we directed her back to the Council.
11. Miss X submitted a fresh complaint to the Council in September 2025. In its response to Miss X, the Council rejected her complaint as it was raised more than 12 months after she became aware of the problem. It also repeated that she had been told of her right to appeal to the Tribunal.

Assessment

12. We will not start an investigation into Miss X’s complaint
13. If a council pays too much housing benefit to someone, it will usually ask them to repay it. The law says a council can recover this money unless it was caused by the Council’s mistakes and it was not reasonable to expect the person to realise they were receiving too much benefit.
14. If someone disagrees with a housing benefit decision, including overpayments, they can ask the Council for a review. If they are not happy with the review decision, then they can then appeal to the Tribunal.
15. The Council told Miss X of her right to appeal its housing benefit decisions in 2022. That is the route the law provides for members of the public to challenge such decisions. We normally expect people to use their right of appeal. The Tribunal could have considered the Council’s decision about the overpayment and decided if Miss X was liable. I do not see any good reason why Miss X could not have appealed. The exclusion at paragraph 3 therefore applies and we will not investigate.
16. Miss X is unhappy with how the Council has dealt with her complaints. We will not normally look at complaint handling in isolation if we are not going to look at the issue which led to the complaint. That applies here and there is no good reason to deviate from that position.

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Final decision

17. We will not investigate this complaint because it was reasonable for Miss X to use her right of appeal.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman