Durham County Council (19 017 657)

Category : Benefits and tax > Local welfare payments

Decision : Closed after initial enquiries

Decision date : 07 Feb 2020

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: Ms X complains about the Council’s refusal to award a Discretionary Hardship Payment (DHP). The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint because there is no evidence of fault by the Council.

The complaint

  1. Ms X complains about the Council’s refusal to award a DHP.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:
  • it is unlikely we would find fault.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

  1. I have considered the comments of the complainant and the Council and the complainant has had an opportunity to comment on the draft decision.,

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What I found

  1. Ms X says that she completed an income and expenditure form to seek a Discretionary Hardship Payment (which is a discretionary top up payment made by councils to claimants unable to afford their rents). She says that the forms are misleading as they refer only to payments to SKY as expenditure.
  2. The Council says that there is provision at the bottom of the form to clarify or add any expenditure which the Council could consider as reasonable.
  3. I am satisfied that Council’s decision not to award a Discretionary Hardship Payment (because her disposable income was too high after considering her income and expenditure) was made without fault. The information form provided to her allowed her to identify all expenditure which she could argue was reasonable and should therefore be ignored.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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