Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s enforcement action to recover unpaid business rates in July 2017. This is because the complaint is late and it is unlikely we could effectively investigate the matter now.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mr X, complains the Council’s enforcement agents forced him to pay business rates owed by a third party in July 2017.

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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 cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I reviewed Mr X’s complaint and the Council’s response. I shared my draft decision with Mr X's representative, Mr Y, and invited his comments.

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What I found

5. Mr X is not a native English speaker. He complains the Council’s enforcement agents collected almost £55,000 from him in July 2017 for unpaid business rates owed by a third party. He says he did not understand what was going on and paid under duress. He suggests the enforcement agent knew he was not liable for the debt but took the money anyway.
6. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. The actions Mr X complains about date back to July 2017 and Mr X did not bring his complaint to us until August 2019; the complaint is therefore more than a year late.
7. While the Ombudsman has discretion to investigate late complaints I have seen no good reasons to exercise our discretion in this case. Mr X is a business-owner and should be aware of business rates; he also did not have to pay the amount demanded if he did not believe he was liable for it.
8. It is also unlikely we could effectively investigate this matter so long after the event. The Council has confirmed there is no video evidence available and that the agent is no longer employed by the company; it is therefore unlikely we could get to the bottom of what happened or say, on balance, that there was fault in the way the enforcement agent dealt with the matter on the Council’s behalf.

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Final decision

9. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because the complaint is late and it is unlikely we could effectively investigate the matter now.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman