Summary: We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about the Council’s delay in issuing her client a revised business rates demand. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council causing Miss X’s client injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Miss X, complains the Council took too long to update its records and issue a revised bill setting out her client’s business rates liability. As a result she says her client missed the deadline to claim for business rates relief.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse effect on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start an investigation if the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Miss X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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Background

4. Miss X contacted the Council in December 2021 to advise a shop owned by her client was empty and should therefore have empty rate relief applied to reduce the amount of business rates owed. The Council updated its records and awarded the relief.
5. The Council visited the shop in September 2022 and spoke to staff who confirmed they were open and had not left the premises. The Council therefore issued a revised business rates demand in October 2022 which removed the empty rates relief. Miss X later confirmed it was actually offices above the shop that had been vacated in 2021 and that her initial email had been incorrect. She asked the Council to recalculate liability for both premises and award business rates relief for any eligible periods between April 2020 and June 2021.
6. The Council confirmed it could not award rates relief for any period before April 2022 as Miss X had missed the deadline, which was 30 September 2022. Miss X was unhappy with this as she felt the Council had delayed in issuing the revised business rates demand. She therefore asked the Council to reconsider its decision and use its discretion to award the relief, but the Council explained it has no discretion in the matter and refused.

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My assessment

7. While Miss X claims it was the Council’s delay that prevented her client from applying for business rates relief this is not the case.
8. Miss X told the Council the premises were empty and did not at any point contact it to correct her mistake. It was not the Council’s responsibility to check the information she provided was correct and Miss X should have realised from the revised bills that her client was benefitting from empty rates relief on the wrong property.
9. The Council later became aware of the error as part of its investigation and issued a revised bill. But while Miss X considers it took too long to do this we could not say any delay caused the injustice she claims. This is because, in order for Miss X to have applied for the relief by the deadline, the Council would have had to issue the revised bill within four weeks.
10. We would expect the Council to issue demands for business rates promptly but there is no set timescale for this. In the circumstances I consider four to six weeks to be a reasonable time for the Council to issue the revised bill and it is therefore unlikely we would find fault.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council and the injustice claimed is primarily the result of Miss X wrongly informing the Council the premises were empty.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman