Summary: We have upheld this complaint about the Council’s failure to complete an Education Health and Care Needs Assessment for Mrs X’s child within the statutory timescale. The Council has agreed to provide a proportionate remedy and this removes the need for us to investigate.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains about delay in the Education Health and Care (EHC) Plan process.  She says the Council has failed to meet the relevant timescales in the SEN Code of Practice. She also says she commissioned an educational psychologist report for her child which the Council said it would use, but the Council later decided to commission its own report, causing delay.

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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 Mrs X and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
5. 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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My assessment

6. Mrs X applied for an EHC Plan for her child on 22 March 2024.  The Council should have completed the assessment process and issued the final EHC Plan within 20 weeks of the initial request, by 9 August 2024. The Council completed the process on 28 August 2025 and has attributed the delay in part to the lack of educational psychology resource.
7. Mrs X is unhappy because she commissioned her own educational psychologist report for her child and suggests the delay was therefore entirely avoidable. But regardless of the reasons, the delay in assessing education health and care needs due to the lack of specialist advice amounts to service failure.
8. We are satisfied that the Council has a plan in place to address the lack of specialist advice. In response to our findings in a previous case it sent us an action plan of its service improvements.
9. We do however accept the Council’s delays caused Mrs X and her child frustration and uncertainty and that this injustice remains unremedied. We have therefore invited the Council to provide a remedy to Mrs X and the Council, to its credit, has agreed to our proposal.

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Agreed action

10. The Council has agreed to the following actions to remedy the complaint:
• Apologise to Mrs X for the delay in the EHC Plan process;
• Pay Mrs X £100 for each month of delay- a total of £1,250.
11. The Council has made an initial payment of £150 while dealing with the complaint under its internal complaints process. It should pay the remaining £1,100 within six weeks of today’s date, by 16 January 2025.
12. I consider the remedy agreed by the Council is suitable and that it is taking steps to address the issue at the heart of this complaint. It is therefore unlikely investigation would achieve anything more for Mrs X.

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Final decision

13. We have upheld this complaint. The Council has agreed to resolve the complaint by providing a proportionate remedy to the injustice caused to Mrs X.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman