Summary: Ms X complained the Council failed to provide her with the correct support when she left care. She said there were delays by the Council in investigating her complaint and its offer of a symbolic financial payment was not enough to remedy the injustice caused to her. We found the Council at fault for failing to provide an appropriate remedy to Ms X. This fault caused injustice to Ms X. The Council will make a higher payment to recognise Ms X’s distress.

The complaint

1. Ms X complained the Council failed to provide her with enough support when she became a care leaver. She said it did not:

• help her find suitable accommodation;
• provide her with support to attend college;
• give her the savings she built up while she was in care; or,
• advise her on how to manage her bills.

2. Ms X says the Council’s failure to support her left her in debt and negatively impacted her mental and physical health.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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’. If there has been fault which has caused significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. When considering complaints we make findings based on the balance of probabilities. This means that we look at the available relevant evidence and decide what was more likely to have happened.
5. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(1), as amended)
6. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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What I have and have not investigated

7. I have considered actions the Council took to remedy any injustice to Ms X, after her complaint to it about its failure to support her when she left care some years prior was upheld.
8. I have also looked at the Council’s handling of Ms X’s complaint.
9. I have not investigated what happened when Ms X left care. Her complaint about this matter has already been upheld under an independent investigation and therefore I see no good reason to re-investigate it.

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How I considered this complaint

10. I considered evidence provided by Ms X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
11. Ms X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Law and guidance

Transition from children to adult services

12. When a child reaches 18 years of age, they are legally an adult and responsibility for meeting their needs moves from the council’s children services to its adult services. The legal basis for assessing their needs changes from the Children Act 1989 to the Care Act 2014.
13. Statutory guidance says transition assessments should begin when the council can be reasonably confident about what the young person’s needs for care and support will look like when they turn 18. The purpose of the assessment is to provide the young person and their family with information so they know what to expect in future and can prepare for adulthood.

The statutory complaints procedure

14. The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. The accompanying statutory guidance, ‘Getting the Best from Complaints’, explains councils’ responsibilities in more detail. We also published practitioner guidance on the procedures, setting out our expectations.
15. The first stage of the procedure is local resolution. Councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
16. If a complainant is not happy with a council’s stage one response, they can ask that it is considered at stage two. At this stage of the procedure, councils appoint an investigating officer (IO) to look into the complaint and an independent person (IP) who is responsible for overseeing the investigation and ensuring its independence.
17. Following the investigation, a senior manager (the adjudicating officer) at the council should carry out an adjudication. The officer considers the IO report and any report from the IP. They decide what the council’s response to the complaint will be, including what action it will take. The adjudicating officer should then write to the complainant with a copy of the investigation report, any report from the independent person and the adjudication response.
18. The whole stage two process should be completed within 25 working days, but guidance allows an extension for up to 65 working days where required.
19. If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage two investigation, they can ask for a stage three review by an independent panel. The council must hold the panel within 30 working days of the date of request, and then issue a final response within 20 working days of the panel hearing

Guidance on remedies

20. The Ombudsman publishes its guidance on remedies which sets out principles that guide our development of recommendations. We encourage organisations to refer to it when developing policies on local resolution of complaints.

What happened

21. Ms X used to be in care, she left care in 2020. At this time, she moved into her own property and was attending college.

Stage one

22. In November 2023 Ms X complained to the Council about how it failed to support her properly when she left care.
23. In January 2024 the Council replied to Ms X’s complaint. It said it had offered Ms X the correct support and so it did not uphold her complaint. Ms X said the Council’s response was unsatisfactory and did not address her concerns, so she asked for the Council to consider her complaint at stage two of the complaint procedure.

Stage two

24. At stage two of the complaint process, the Council partially upheld Ms X’s complaint. It accepted it did not do enough to help her furnish her flat, set up an affordable energy repayment plan, and it delayed paying her savings to her.
25. However, the Council did not uphold her complaints that it did not do enough to support her when she moved into her own property or when she started college. Ms X asked for a review at stage three of the complaints procedure because she disagreed with the Council’s findings not to uphold those two parts of her complaint.

Stage three

26. In October 2024 the Council issued its final response to Ms X’s complaint, after it was reviewed by an independent panel. It upheld all parts of Ms X’s complaint.
27. As part of the panel’s findings, it gave recommendations to the Council on how to remedy any injustice caused to Ms X. In respect of the complaints that the Council did not do enough to support Ms X when she moved into her property (complaint one) or when she started college (complaint five), the panel said:

“In view of the distress experienced by [Ms X] as a result of the failure of the local authority to follow good practice in relation to Complaint [one] and [five], we recommend the Council should consider financial redress in line with the guidance provided by the [Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman].”

28. The panel also recommended the Council support Ms X to set up an affordable energy repayment plan.

Action plan

29. The Council made an action plan of how it would remedy any injustice caused to Ms X, based on the panel’s findings. It offered:

• an apology;
• for a social worker to contact her to set up the energy repayment plan; and
• £250 to recognise her distress.

30. In the Council’s stage three outcome letter, it said the £250 was to recognise the time and trouble she experienced with her complaint. It said it accepted that two of her complaints could have been resolved earlier in the complaints process.
31. Ms X complained to the Council about its offer of £250, and said it was not enough to remedy her distress. The Council then offered to pay for her to have 12 driving lessons. Ms X told the Council the driving lessons would not be helpful to her, because it was unlikely she would pass her driving test after just 12 lessons and she would not be able to afford further lessons. Therefore, the Council agreed to pay her the cash value of the lessons instead as a good will gesture. The cash value was agreed to be £450.

Complaint to the Ombudsman

32. Ms X then complained to us. She said the Council’s offer of £250 was not sufficient and the Council did not help her set up an affordable repayment plan as it said it would.

Analysis

The Council’s actions when Ms X left care

33. If a complaint has already been through the three-stage Children Act complaints procedure, this means the complainant has already had access to an independent investigation.
34. Therefore, we will not normally investigate such a complaint unless we have reason to believe the previous investigation was flawed.
35. I have considered the documents from Ms X’s complaint and I note that:

• those involved in the investigation appear to be suitably independent and considered relevant evidence;
• each part of the complaint was considered and addressed by the Council;
• parts of the complaint were upheld at stage two by the Council and therefore they do not need further investigation; and
• the complaint was then fully upheld by the panel at stage three and therefore requires no extra scrutiny.

36. Because of this, it is unlikely we would be able to add anything significant to what the Council has already said by reinvestigating these matters.

Energy repayment plan

37. Ms X told us the Council had not resolved the issue with her energy repayment plan, but the Council told us it completed this action.
38. We asked Ms X to provide evidence that she was still making unaffordable repayments for her energy bills or her energy providers had chased her for payments, but she did not respond to us.
39. On the balance of probabilities, I think it is likely the Council has completed this action. The Council agreed to this action in October 2024 and told us Ms X’s social worker offered to help her to contact her energy company. If an affordable energy repayment plan had not been in place since then, it is likely Ms X’s energy providers would have chased her for payment against the outstanding debt on her accounts. As she did not say this was the case when we discussed her complaint, I think it is likely a repayment plan is in place.

Complaint handling

40. There are time limits for councils to complete the statutory complaints process and failure to meet these deadlines would be fault.
41. Ms X first complained to the Council in November 2023 and the Council’s final response was in October 2024. This was an overall delay of around 12 weeks, which is fault by the Council.
42. I have considered the injustice this delay caused to Ms X. I do not think there was any significant injustice to Ms X caused by the 12-week delay of the Council considering her complaint. This is because Ms X was seeking a remedy for injustice that happened some years prior and so, in proportion, a 12-week delay did not significantly add to her distress.

Symbolic financial remedy

43. The independent panel recommended the Council make a symbolic financial payment to recognise the distress caused to Ms X because of its failings when she moved into her property and started college. The panel said the Council should consider the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies when deciding how much to pay.
44. The Council told us it considered our guidance and decided £250 would be an appropriate remedy. It told Ms X the payment of £250 was to recognise her time and trouble of bringing her complaint about moving into her property and starting college.
45. The Council is at fault for how it interpreted the panel’s recommendation and how it applied our guidance on remedies. This is because the panel’s recommendation was to remedy the distress caused to Ms X by the Council’s failings when she left care, not her time and trouble for bringing a complaint about these matters. Therefore, it has applied the recommended financial remedy for faults in complaint handling, which is not correct.
46. Our guidance explains that distress caused to a person by the failings of a Council when they leave care is different to the time and trouble they can experience in bringing a complaint about these issues.
47. This fault by the Council has left Ms X with unremedied injustice. The Council accepted it did not offer Ms X enough support when she left care, but has not offered a symbolic financial payment to remedy the distress she experienced during this time.
48. I have reviewed our guidance on remedies, in particular, section 2.7 titled “Make symbolic payments”. I have considered how this applies to the distress Ms X would have experienced by not being offered enough support at a key transitional time in her life.
49. Our guidance states we would normally recommend a payment of up to £500 for distress, but we may recommend higher payments if we decide the situation was particularly severe, prolonged and if those affected were vulnerable.
50. When considering if a higher payment is appropriate, I have considered the following points:

• Ms X was at a crucial stage of her life.
• She was vulnerable because she was a care leaver.
• The effects of the Council’s failures continued to affect her for a few years after she left care.

51. I recommended a total payment of £750 as an appropriate remedy for any injustice caused to her by the Council’s fault. The Council agreed this.
52. The Council has already paid £250 to Ms X. I have considered this and deducted it from the remedy below.
53. The Council paid Ms X £450 instead of paying for 12 driving lessons, however I have not deducted this amount from the symbolic financial payment. This is because the Council agreed to give Ms X driving lessons and this would not have satisfied the recommendation from the panel of a financial remedy for Ms X’s distress. That the Council later agreed to pay Ms X the cash value of the driving lessons does not alter the fact the original offer was not in-line with the panel’s recommendation.

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Action

54. Within one month of our final decision, the Council will make a payment of £500 to Ms X to recognise the distress caused to her by its failings when she left care.
55. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman