Summary: We have upheld this complaint because the Council handled Mr X’s complaint under its corporate procedure instead of the children’s statutory complaints procedure. The Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by dealing with it under the statutory complaint procedure. It will also make a payment to Mr X to acknowledge the delay.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains about many aspects of the care and placement the Council arranged for his child. He also complains about the cost of contact visits to his child’s placement and that the Council processed his complaint under its corporate complaint procedure instead of the statutory complaint procedure.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions an organisation has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

The statutory complaints procedure

5. 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.
6. The first stage of the procedure is local resolution, where councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
7. 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 investigator and an independent person who is responsible for overseeing the investigation. Councils have up to 13 weeks to complete stage two of the process from the date of request.
8. 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 days of the date of request and then issue a final response within 20 days of the panel hearing.

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My assessment

9. If we were to investigate it is likely we would find fault causing the complainant injustice because the Council treated the complaint under its corporate process instead of the statutory complaints process. If it had handled the complaint under the statutory process, it likely would have completed around five months ago.
10. We therefore asked the Council to consider remedying the injustice caused by its actions by progressing Mr X’s complaint to stage two without further delay. We also asked the Council to consider making a payment to him of £200 to acknowledge the delay it caused by its complaint handling.
11. To its credit, the Council agreed to resolve the complaint by carrying out these actions within four weeks of this decision.

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Final decision

12. We have upheld this complaint. The Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by providing an appropriate remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman