Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about housing benefit overpayments and how the Council handled her housing benefit claim. It is reasonable to expect Ms X to appeal to a tribunal.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains the Council failed to correctly assess her housing benefit claim. She said the Council did not tell her it uses information from her Universal Credit account to assess her housing benefit claim. Ms X said the Council told her this only after it had issued overpayment decisions.
2. Ms X complains the Council did not consider the information she submitted and failed to correct or investigate its errors. She said the overpayment demands have caused her distress.
3. Ms X would like the Council to reassess her housing benefit claim and correct or cancel the overpayments. She said the Council should also improve its procedures to make sure others are not affected in the same way as her.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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).

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information provided by Ms X and the Council.
7. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

8. Ms X complains about the Council’s housing benefit overpayment decisions.
9. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because it is reasonable to expect her to go to the tribunal. The tribunal considers appeals or disputes about the amount of benefit and its calculation, treatment of income and overpayments.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because she can appeal to a tribunal.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman