Summary: We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint about the Councils handling of her business rates account. There is not enough evidence of fault to justify an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains the Council failed to process her for business rates hardship application. Mrs X also complains the Council failed to correctly apply the credits from her rateable value reduction and failed to protect sensitive information. Mrs X also complains about the Council’s complaint handling.

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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 not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or, there is another body better placed to consider this complaint. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
4. The Information Commissioner's Office considers complaints about freedom of information. Its decision notices may be appealed to the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights). So, where we receive complaints about freedom of information, we normally consider it reasonable to expect the person to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner.
5. We normally expect someone to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner if they have a complaint about data protection. However, we may decide to investigate if we think there are good reasons. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

8. Mrs X's business was in temporary financial difficulty. Mrs X contacted the Council to request a pause to business rates payments explaining she would be able to pay the rates in full in the future. Mrs X also asked to make a hardship application.
9. The Council said it would need a written hardship application from Mrs X but did put a pause on her business rates account.
10. Hardship relief is an exceptional relief awarded to reduce business rates. To be eligible a business must prove it would be in financial difficulty without the reduction, and that giving the hardship relief is in the interests of local people.
11. While Mrs X later contacted the Council to explain her businesses financial situation, I have seen no evidence Mrs X submitted a hardship application or requested a reduction in the business rates. Mrs X’s further emails, appear to be a request for a deferral or payment plan rather than a reduction in the business rates. I am therefore unable to find evidence of fault in the Council not processing a hardship application at this point. It is open for Mrs X to contact the Council and submit a hardship application if she is seeking a reduction in her business rates.
12. Mrs X said the Council did not properly apply credits following a reduction in the rateable value of her property. The Council say it added the credits to Mrs X’s business rates account and offered to refund the credits to Mrs X if she would prefer. There is insufficient evidence of fault in how the Council processed the credits.
13. Mrs X says the Council did not protect sensitive information she sent to it. In the Councils response to her complaint, it stated no information had been shared with any third parties nor had any been involved at any stage of the complaint procedure.
14. The Information Commissioner’s Office is the organisation best placed to consider complaints about how organisations handle people’s data. If Mrs X would like to complain about the Council’s handling of her data, it would be reasonable for her to raise this with the Information Commissioner’s Office.
15. Mrs X also complains of poor communication and complaint handling. We will not investigate this part of Mrs X’s complaint because it is not a good use of public resources to investigate complaints about complaint handling when we are not looking at the substantive issues.

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Final decision

16. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault to justify an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman