Summary: Mrs X complained the Council failed to provide support for her son, Mr Y, and failed to reimburse her costs for Mr Y’s support. She also complained it delayed completing an annual review of Mr Y’s Education, Health and Care Plan. We found the Council at fault for failing to complete an annual review of Mr Y’s Education, Health and Care Plan and failing to provide him with support it said it would. This fault caused injustice to Mrs X and Mr Y. The Council agreed to apologise, review Mr Y’s Education, Health and Care Plan, and reimburse Mrs X's support costs to remedy injustice.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complained the Council did not complete a review of Mr Y’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan. She said this left them with uncertainty about what support he was entitled to.
2. Mrs X also complained the Council agreed to provide art tuition for Mr Y, but it did not. She said she had to pay for the tuition instead and when she asked the Council to reimburse her, it refused to pay all her costs.

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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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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered evidence provided by Mrs X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
8. Mrs 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

Relevant law and guidance

Education, Health and Care Plans

9. A child or young person with Special Educational Needs (SEN) may have an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan. This document sets out the child’s needs and what arrangements should be made to meet them. The EHC Plan is set out in sections.
10. The council has a duty to make sure the child or young person receives the special educational provision set out in section F of an EHC Plan (Children and Families Act 2014, section 42).

Reviews of EHC Plans

11. The council must arrange for the EHC Plan to be reviewed at least once a year to make sure it is up to date. The council 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 child’s parents or the young person and the educational placement. A review meeting must then take place. Following the review meeting the council must issue a decision to either 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) 
12. Where the council proposes to amend an EHC Plan, the law says it must send the child’s parent or the young person a copy of the existing (non-amended) Plan and an accompanying notice providing details of the proposed amendments, including copies of any evidence to support the proposed changes. (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 amended final EHC Plan within a further eight weeks.

Education Otherwise Than At School

13. If school or college is not appropriate for the child or young person with an EHC Plan (for either all or part of their education), the council can arrange for any special educational provision which the child or young person requires to be delivered somewhere other than in a school, college or early years setting. This is known as ‘education otherwise than at school’ (EOTAS). (Children and Families Act 2014, section 61)
14. When a child or young person receives EOTAS at home, the EOTAS package should be set out in section F of their EHC Plan. (Derbyshire CC v EM and DM (SEN) [2019] UKUT 240 (AAC))

Personal budgets

15. A personal budget is the amount of money the council has identified it needs to pay to secure the provision in a child or young person’s EHC Plan. One way that councils can deliver a personal budget is through direct payments. These are cash payments made to the child’s parent or the young person so they can commission the provision in the EHC Plan themselves.
16. A child’s parent or the young person has the right to request a personal budget during a statutory review of an existing EHC Plan.

Principles of Good Administrative Practice

17. We have published guidance called Principles of Good Administrative Practice. This guidance sets out the standards we expect to see from councils when we investigate complaints.

What happened

18. Mr Y had an EHC Plan. The Council agreed to provide Mr Y with EOTAS, but this was not set out in his EHC Plan.
19. In March 2024 the Council agreed to provide Mr Y with English, maths and art tuition for 12 months. It paid an agency to deliver the tuition to Mr Y.
20. In November 2024 Mrs X told the Council that Mr Y was not getting his art tuition. She started paying for an art tutor.
21. Also in November 2024, Mrs X told the Council she was going to ask it for a personal budget so that she could get direct payments to pay for the art tutor. The Council told her she could ask for this at the next review of Mr Y’s EHC Plan.
22. In February 2025 the Council held a review meeting of Mr Y’s EHC Plan.
23. In March 2025 Mrs X submitted a formal request for a personal budget.
24. In July 2025 the Council agreed to provide Mrs X with direct payments for art tuition. It said it would backdate the payments to March 2025.
25. In August 2025 the Council sent a draft amended EHC Plan for Mr Y.
26. In February 2026 Mrs X told us the Council had still not sent an amended final EHC Plan for Mr Y, following the review of his EHC Plan in February 2025.

Analysis

Sending the amended final EHC Plan

27. The review meeting of Mr Y’s EHC Plan was held in February 2025. The Council agreed to amend Mr Y’s EHC Plan. By February 2026, the Council had still not sent an amended final EHC Plan to Mr Y.
28. If a council agrees to amend an EHC Plan after an annual review, then the Council must send the draft amended EHC Plan within four weeks of the review meeting, and the amended final EHC Plan within 12 weeks of the review meeting.
29. The Council did not meet these deadlines. This was fault by the Council.
30. This fault caused injustice to Mrs X and Mr Y because it left them with uncertainty and no right to appeal the contents of the EHC Plan if they disagreed with it, because the right of appeal only comes with the amended final EHC Plan.
31. This injustice was increased because Mr Y’s EOTAS package was not included in section F of his EHC Plan, which meant until the Council amended his EHC Plan, he did not have a legally enforceable EOTAS package.
32. The Council accepted it was at fault for failing to send Mr Y’s amended final EHC Plan. It said the issues were caused by a period of significant staff turnover and a restructure. It said it has now recruited more permanent staff and changed processes to improve its service. These actions are proportionate to address the concerns raised in this complaint and we will monitor the effectiveness of the Council’s actions through our casework.
33. As explained in our guidance on remedies, where a council’s fault has caused someone avoidable distress, we can recommend a symbolic payment to acknowledge this. In Mr Y’s case, £300 is appropriate to recognise the uncertainty caused to him by the Council delaying sending his amended final EHC Plan.

The personal budget

34. Mrs X complained she asked the Council to make a personal budget and agree to direct payments for Mr Y in November 2024, but it didn’t do this until after she made a formal request in March 2025.
35. Mrs X also complained the Council did not backdate the direct payments to cover her costs for an art tutor to November 2024. She said it only agreed to backdate them to March 2025, because that was when it accepted she submitted a request for a personal budget.
36. The law says parents and young people have a right to request a council makes a personal budget when the council issues a draft amended EHC Plan after an annual review.
37. Therefore, there was no fault by the Council for not considering Mrs X’s request earlier. Mr Y’s EHC Plan did not list art tuition in section F and direct payments are made to secure provision in section F of an EHC Plan. By waiting until after the review of Mr Y’s EHC Plan, it allowed the Council to consider Mr Y’s updated needs and support when making a personal budget.

Art tuition costs

38. The Council agreed to pay for English, maths and art tuition for Mr Y through an agency. It said it would pay for this from March 2024 until March 2025, at which point it would review it.
39. In November 2024 Mrs X told the Council that Mr Y was not receiving his art tuition and the agency could no longer provide it.
40. The Council told Mrs X it was confident the agency could provide the services it should. It told us it did not reimburse Mrs X’s costs for an art tutor between November 2024 and March 2025, because it was already paying for the agency to provide art tuition for that period.
41. Our Principles of Good Administrative Practice says councils should effectively manage contracts with third parties who are delivering services on behalf of the council and they should work with third parties to make sure they can meet people’s needs.
42. Based on the available evidence, it seems likely, on balance, the Council did not act to make sure the art tuition was available to Mr Y once Mrs X raised concerns in November 2024. There was no evidence the Council investigated Mrs X’s concerns. This was fault.
43. This fault caused injustice to Mrs X because she had to pay for Mr Y’s art tuition to ensure he received it.
44. Our guidance on remedies explains that were we find someone had to pay for a service privately they should not have had to pay for because of fault by a council, we can consider reimbursing their costs.
45. In Mr Y’s case, it was reasonable for Mrs X to pay for Mr Y’s art tuition because the agency could not provide any art tuition, so he would not have received it otherwise.
46. The Council has agreed to reimburse Mrs X’s art tuition costs for November 2024 until March 2025.

Record keeping

47. The Council could not send us all the information we asked it for because it said actions were not always recorded on Mr Y’s case notes.
48. Our Principles of Good Administrative Practice says keeping accurate records enables councils to be open and accountable. Therefore, not having all the information we asked for was fault by the Council.
49. This fault added to Mr Y and Mrs X’s injustice, because it caused them further uncertainty as we could not review all the actions the Council took in Mr Y’s case.

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Agreed action

50. Within four weeks of our final decision, the Council will:
1. apologise to Mrs X and Mr Y for the injustice caused to them by the failings identified during this investigation. This apology should be in accordance with our guidance for making an effective apology;
2. reimburse Mrs X her costs for an art tutor between November 2024 and March 2025, provided she can supply evidence of her costs;
3. pay Mrs X, on behalf of her and Mr Y, £300 to acknowledge the uncertainty caused to them by the Council’s delay in sending an amended final EHC Plan and its record-keeping fault; and,
4. arrange and hold a fresh review meeting of Mr Y’s EHC Plan, if it has not completed a review (and if relevant, amendments) of his EHC Plan within the last 12 months. After it holds the review meeting, the Council should pay particular attention to the legal deadlines for completing reviews of EHC Plans and, if relevant, sending out amended final EHC Plans.
51. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

52. I find fault causing injustice. The Council has agreed actions to remedy injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman