Summary: Mrs F complained about the Council’s handling of her son’s education and special educational needs provision. The Council has accepted there was a delay in holding an annual review and responding to Mrs F’s complaint. The Council should make symbolic payments to Mrs F to remedy the distress and time and trouble this caused. We have not found fault in the other parts of Mrs F’s complaint.

The complaint

1. Mrs F complained about the Council’s handling of her son’s education and special educational needs (SEN) provision. In particular, she complained the Council failed to:
1. Put education or SEN provision in place from September 2023 to April 2025.
2. Appoint a specialist teacher from September 2023 to August 2024.
3. Hold the 2024 Annual Review on time.
4. Issue a final education, health and care (EHC) plan on 16 August 2024 which fully addressed her son’s SEN or offer her a meeting to discuss it.
5. Fund speech and language therapy (SALT) on time causing two sessions to be cancelled.
6. Put education in place from March 2025 to May 2025.
7. Send a formal response to her complaint for almost a year and there were poor communications.
2. Mrs F says the Council’s failings over the years have affected her son’s education and caused his mental health to deteriorate, resulting in a suicide attempt. They have also caused significant distress to her and her husband, affecting their mental health and ability to work.

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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. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. 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)
6. The First-tier Tribunal (Special Educational Needs and Disability) considers appeals against council decisions regarding special educational needs. We refer to it as the Tribunal in this decision statement.
7. We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal about the same matter. We also cannot investigate a complaint if in doing so we would overlap with the role of a tribunal to decide something which has been or could have been referred to it to resolve using its own powers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
8. It is our decision whether to start, and when to end an investigation into something the law allows us to investigate. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 24A(6) and 34B(8), as amended)
9. 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)
10. 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

11. I have not investigated part d) of the complaint. This is because Mrs F appealed to the Tribunal about the EHC plan. As set out in paragraph 7, the law says we cannot investigate, therefore.
12. Mrs F complained to us in May 2025 about events from September 2023. As set out in paragraph 5, I am exercising discretion to investigate from then. This is because Mrs F had good reason not to come to us sooner due to a delay in the Council’s complaint response.
13. My investigation ends in May 2025. This is because our policy says where there are on-going issues we should specify an end date beyond which we will not investigate. This should be no later than the date when the complaint was submitted to us.

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How I considered this complaint

14. I considered the information Mrs F sent, the Council’s response to my enquiries and:
• The Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice ("the Code")
• The Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 (“the SEND Regulations”)
15. Mrs F and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

Relevant law and guidance

Special educational needs

16. A child with special educational needs (SEND) may have an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan. The EHC plan sets out the child's educational needs and what arrangements should be made to meet them. The Council is responsible for making sure that arrangements specified in the EHC plan are put in place and reviewed each year. Parents have a right of appeal to the Tribunal if they disagree with the EHC plan.
17. The Ombudsman cannot look at complaints about what is in the EHC plan but can look at other matters, such as where support set out has not been provided or where there have been delays in the process.

Reviewing EHC Plans

18. Councils must arrange for the EHC plan to be reviewed at least once a year. They must complete the review within 12 months of the first EHC plan and within 12 months of any later reviews. The annual review begins with consulting the parents and the educational placement. A review meeting must then take place. The process is only complete when the council issues its decision to amend, maintain or cease to maintain the EHC Plan. This must happen within four weeks of the meeting. (Section 20(10) Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 and SEN Code paragraph 9.176)
19. Where the council proposes to amend an EHC Plan, the law says it must send the child’s parent a copy of the existing (non-amended) Plan and an accompanying notice providing details of the proposed amendments. (Section 22(2) Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 and SEN Code paragraph 9.194). Case law sets out this should happen within four weeks of the date of the review meeting. Case law also found councils must issue the final amended EHC plan within a further eight weeks, i.e. within 12 weeks of the review meeting.

Complaint procedures

20. The Council’s complaints’ procedure has two stages. The Council aims to issue a response within 20 working days. However complex complaints may take longer to investigate.
21. In 2023, we identified the Council had a backlog of responses to complaints about SEND matters. We issued a report (our ref: 22 003 403) asking the Council to develop an action plan to address the backlog. The Council recruited a temporary backlog team in September 2023 to work on the complaints in chronological order. This remained in place until the end of March 2025, when the volume of overdue complaints had significantly reduced and there had been an improvement in average response times.

What happened

22. I have summarised the key events. This is not meant to describe everything that happened or all the correspondence between Mrs F and the Council.

Background

23. Mrs F’s son, J, has special educational needs. He has education other than at school (EOTAS) via online tuition. This was provided by a tuition company “Tutor A”.
24. An EHC plan was issued in June 2023, when J was in Year 7. The plan says the next annual review was due in April 2024. The SEN provision set out in the plan included:
• Eight hours per week online tutoring
• A laptop with a camera
• An assessment and review of J’s EOTAS package by a “specialist teacher e.g. provision evaluation officer” once a term
• Access to therapies and support provided by a therapist or specialist in autism spectrum disorder and demand avoidance
• Individual counselling or mentoring
• Intervention to support engagement with areas of interest
• Physical education sessions
• Provision to address J’s sensory processing difficulties following an occupational therapy (OT) assessment
25. We have previously investigated a complaint from Mrs F (our ref: 22 014 793) about matters including lack of education and lack of special educational provision. In December 2023, we issued a final decision and the Council agreed to make payments to Mrs F to remedy the lack of provision from June to December 2023. This included an ongoing payment of £100 per week until provision was put in place.
26. On 18 December, Mrs F emailed the Council raising concerns about an incomplete response to a subject access request she had made. She also said that no action had been taken on J’s EHC plan and no education was in place. The Council decided to register this as a complaint.
27. On 16 February, the Council emailed Mrs F a draft personal budget. It also said Tutor A would re-start online tuition on 19 February. In line with the Ombudsman’s recommendation a payment would be made to Mrs F to cover six weeks of missed education and SEND provision from 2 January to 19 February. A speech and language therapy (SALT) assessment would be done in March. The Council was still looking for an OT who could assess J. The Council would refund Mrs F the cost of the laptop insurance (£115).

Mrs F’s complaint April 2024

28. Mrs F complained to the Council on 5 April 2024 about a number of issues, including:
• J had had no education from September 2023 to 19 February 2024.
• The specialist teacher provision was not in place.
• The annual review was late.
• The Council had wrongly paid Mrs F instead of paying the OT directly.
• The Council had not paid the full amount recommended by the Ombudsman. A further four weeks of SALT provision had been missed in March 2024, so £400 was due.
• The laptop insurance refund had not yet been paid.
• There had been no further communication about the personal budget; it needed to cover more mileage.
29. In subsequent correspondence over the next few weeks, the Council said:
• The EHC plan stated that a provision evaluation officer could be used to review J’s EOTAS package. Mrs F would prefer to use a specialist teacher. The Council said specialist teacher provision would be put in place as soon as it could be arranged but this did not prevent J’s education or SEN provision being delivered. Mrs F said she would look to source a specialist teacher to start from September 2024.
• It had proposed dates in May for the annual review.
• The Council had paid Mrs F for OT and SALT as she had sourced the therapists, so their invoices had been addressed to her. In future the Council would pay the companies directly.
• The monies due to Mrs F were now paid.
• Mileage costs were now included in the personal budget.
30. The annual review was held on 3 July. The subsequent final EHC plan was issued on 16 August including the following provision:
• online tutoring eight hours per week; PE two hours per week; mentoring one hour per week; SALT one hour per fortnight; therapy one hour per fortnight; specialist teacher termly review.
31. The personal budget would fund the mentor, PE, travel and “personalised intervention 3hrs per week by adults working with J”.
32. Mrs F appealed to the Tribunal about the plan.
33. In January 2025, the Council issued its formal stage one response to Mrs F’s complaints of December 2023 and April 2024. It said a specialist teacher had been in place since 16 August 2024. Mrs F remained dissatisfied and asked for her complaint to be escalated.

January 2025 - SALT

34. Mrs F told the Council in January that the SALT was no longer able to work with J, as a result he had missed two sessions. Mrs F suggested another SALT but the change of provider needed to be approved by the Council’s SEN Therapies team. This was done on 28 February 2025. The Council approved funding backdated to the start of February to enable the missed two sessions to be provided.

Mrs F’s February 2025 complaint

35. Mrs F made a further complaint on 24 February that J had missed four SALT sessions but the Council was only refunding two. She raised concerns about Tutor A and said that the specialist teacher’s recent recommendations about J’s EOTAS package had been ignored.
36. The Council decided to incorporate this complaint with Mrs F’s earlier one to which it had not yet issued a stage two response.

March to May 2025

37. In March 2025, J had a serious mental health episode involving self-harm. Mrs F emailed Tutor A to say J would not be returning because Tutor A could not meet J’s needs. Tutor A told the Council on 10 March its tuition was ending with immediate effect.
38. Mrs F suggested a new tuition company but they were not on the Council’s approved list. The Council looked for an alternative provider and on 28 March it found Tutor B who agreed to meet with Mrs F. Following that meeting, Mrs F told Tutor B and the Council she did not consider they were suitable.
39. The Tribunal issued its decision on 11 April. It ordered changes to J’s EHC plan.
40. Mrs F came to the Ombudsman; she had not yet had the final response to her complaints. The Council’s final complaint response was issued on 11 July 2025. In summary, the Council said:
• A specialist teacher had been in place to review J’s EOTAS package since August 2024 and had completed her first report in January 2025. This was in line with the EHC plan requiring termly reviews.
• There had been a delay completing the annual review in 2024 and issuing the final EHC plan. It apologised and offered Mrs F £200 to redress this.
• The issues with the personal budget had resolved.
• The missed SALT sessions in January to February 2025 had been remedied with extra sessions the following term.
• It had found a new tuition provider in March 2025 but Mrs F had declined it.
• There had been delays responding to Mrs F’s complaint due to the complaints’ backlog. It apologised and offered £800 to remedy distress caused by delays in complaint handling.

My findings

Put education or SEN provision in place from September 2023 to April 2025.

41. Our previous investigation found a lack of provision from June to December 2023 and recommended the Council make payments to Mrs F to redress the injustice caused. This included an ongoing payment until provision was in place. The Council has made these payments, including the further £400 for missed SALT until 19 March 2024. So missed provision from September 2023 to March 2024 has already been remedied and I have discontinued my investigation into this period in line with our power set out in paragraph 8.
42. From March 2024 to March 2025, Tutor A was providing education. I have seen no evidence that SEND provision was not in place, so I do not find fault. I deal with the specialist teacher complaint below.

Appoint a specialist teacher from September 2023 to August 2024.

43. The June 2023 EHC plan said J’s EOTAS package should be reviewed each term by a “specialist teacher e.g. provision evaluation officer”. As there was no provision until February 2024, this could not be done. I have dealt with this in paragraph 41 above.
44. After J’s education re-started in February 2024, Mrs F complained in April that the specialist teacher was not in place. The Council said that J’s package could be reviewed by the provision evaluation officer (SEN Inclusion Adviser) at the end of that term.
45. Mrs F was dissatisfied with that as she wanted a specialist teacher to carry out the review. But it was not fault by the Council as the EHC plan says the review could be done by an officer. I therefore find that the lack of a review of J’s EOTAS package in the spring and summer term 2023/24 was not caused by fault.
46. Mrs F sourced a specialist teacher who was in place from September 2024. She reviewed J’s EOTAS package at the end of the autumn term 2024/25 and issued her report in January 2025. There was no fault.

Hold the 2024 Annual Review on time.

47. The June 2023 EHC plan said the next annual review was due in April 2024. I have seen no evidence of an annual review in 2023. The 2024 review therefore had to be held within 12 months of the issue of the 2023 EHC plan, i.e. by 16 June. It was held on 3 July, so there was a three-week delay.
48. Following the annual review, the amended final EHC plan should have been issued within 12 weeks. So if the review had not been delayed the plan would have been issued by 8 September 2024. It was issued on 16 August, so there was no fault.
49. The Council has already accepted there was a delay in the annual review and offered Mrs F £200 to remedy the distress caused. This is a proportionate and appropriate remedy in line with our guidance.

Fund SALT on time causing two sessions to be cancelled.

50. The EHC plan said J should have a SALT session every fortnight. In January 2025 the SALT was no longer able to work with J due to a change in her working arrangements. Mrs F told the Council this and that as a result J had missed two sessions. The Council found a new SALT on 28 February, by which time J had missed a further two sessions.
51. The Council backdated the SALT funding and says extra sessions were provided the following term to make up for the missed sessions.
52. I do not find any delay by the Council in looking for a new SALT provider and am satisfied that the loss of provision in January/February has been remedied.

Put education in place from March 2025 to May 2025.

53. After the breakdown of the tuition provided by Tutor A in March 2025, Mrs F suggested a new provider to the Council but they were not on the Council’s approved list. The Council found an alternative provider (Tutor B) on 28 March, so I do not find any delay.
54. Mrs F did not agree to use Tutor B but I have seen no evidence it was an unsuitable provision. The Council was entitled to decide to offer Tutor B and I have seen no fault in the way it made this decision. I therefore cannot criticise it. I do not find fault.

Send a formal response to her complaint for almost a year and there were poor communications.

55. Mrs F raised concerns in December 2023 which the Council decided to register as a complaint. It was entitled to make this decision, following its complaint policy, and I do not find fault. Mrs F then made a further complaint in April 2024.
56. Due to the Council’s SEND complaints backlog it did not formally respond until January 2025 and July 2025, though I note that officers had replied to Mrs F’s queries in May 2024. Nonetheless, the Council has accepted there was delay in dealing with the complaint. It has apologised and offered Mrs F £800 to remedy the time and trouble and distress this caused. This is a proportionate and appropriate remedy in line with our guidance.
57. The Council has already taken actions to reduce its SEND complaints backlog, so I have not recommended any further service improvements.

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Action

58. Within a month of my final decision, the Council has agreed to pay Mrs F:
• £200 to remedy the distress caused by the delay holding an annual review in 2024, and
• £800 to remedy the distress and time and trouble caused by the delay in responding to the complaint.
59. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

60. There was fault by the Council. The actions the Council has agreed to take remedy the injustice caused. I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman