Summary: Miss X complained about delays in the Education and Health process for her child. We found the Council failed to complete an Education Health and Care Needs Assessment and issue an Education Health and Care Plan for the complainant’s child within statutory timescales. This caused Miss X avoidable distress, frustration and uncertainty. It also meant her child missed six weeks of provision and delayed Miss X’s appeal rights. The Council has already offered Miss X a suitable remedy and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about delays in the Education and Health (EHC) Plan process for her daughter (Y). Miss X says her daughter was left without essential support which has caused her distress, frustration and avoidable time and trouble chasing the Council. Miss X says she has also incurred avoidable expenses for private reports. The Council proposed a remedy which Miss X was not satisfied with.

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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 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)
3. Service failure can happen when an organisation fails to provide a service as it should have done because of circumstances outside its control. We do not need to show any blame, intent, flawed policy or process, or bad faith by an organisation to say service failure (fault) has occurred. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1), as amended)
4. 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.
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 Miss X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
8. Miss X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision before making a final decision.

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What I found

Education and Health Care (EHC) Plans

9. A child or young person with special educational needs 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. We cannot direct changes to the sections about their needs, education, or the name of the educational placement. Only the tribunal or the council can do this.
10. The Special educational needs and disability code of practice sets out the procedure for carrying out EHC needs assessments and producing EHC Plans. It says: 

• where the council receives a request for an EHC needs assessment it must decide whether to agree to the assessment and send its decision to the parent of the child within six weeks; 
• assessing needs and developing EHC Plans “must be carried out in a timely manner”. Steps must be completed as soon as practicable; 
• if the council assesses a child, it must decide either to issue or refuse to issue an EHC Plan within 16 weeks; and
• if the council issues an EHC Plan, the procedure from asking for an assessment until issue of the final EHC Plan must take no more than 20 weeks (unless certain specific circumstances apply).

11. As part of the EHC needs assessment, councils must gather advice from relevant professionals (SEND 2014 Regulations, Regulation 6(1)). This includes advice and information from an Educational Psychologist (EP). Those consulted have six weeks to provide the advice.
12. Parents have a right of appeal to the SEND Tribunal. This is only engaged once a decision not to assess, issue or amend a plan has been made and sent to the parent or a final EHC plan has been issued.

What happened – summary of key events

13. In July 2024 Y’s educational setting asked the Council to complete an EHC needs assessment.
14. In August 2024 the Council refused to assess Y. Miss X appealed to the Tribunal.
15. On 2 April 2025 the Tribunal directed the Council to complete an EHC needs assessment for Y.
16. In June 2025 Miss X complained to the Council. Miss X said the Council had failed to carry out the needs assessment within statutory timescales. The Council responded to the complaint and acknowledged the assessment should have been completed early-mid June. It said the delay was caused by an administrative error. The Council offered Miss X a payment of £500 for the distress caused by the delay.
17. In July the Council completed the EHC needs assessment.
18. In August Miss X contacted the Council about ongoing delays with the EHC Plan. Miss X refused the £500 remedy and asked for her complaint to escalated to the next stage.
19. The Council did not formally respond to the complaint but acknowledged there had been an issue with allocating the case to an EP. It clarified the offer of £500 could be accepted without prejudice as this was offered in recognition of the poor communication and experience of the Council’s handling of the case. Miss X accepted the Council’s offer of £500.
20. At the end of August an EP was allocated to the case.
21. In November the Council sent Miss X a draft EHC Plan and issued two further drafts after receiving Miss X’s comments.
22. On 16 December the Council sent Miss X a final EHC Plan.
23. On 14 January 2026 the Council sent Miss X an amended final Plan.
24. In February the Council responded to Miss X’s complaint at stage two of its complaint procedure. The Council acknowledged it had breached statutory timescales, and this had caused Miss X and Y anxiety and impacted their right to appeal. The Council offered to pay Miss X £600 for the delay and an additional £250 for the distress caused. In total the Council offered Miss X £850.
25. Miss X has appealed to the Tribunal.

Analysis

26. We expect councils to follow statutory timescales set out in the law and the Code. We are likely to find fault where there are significant breaches of those timescales.
27. The whole process should have been completed within 20 weeks. The Council should have issued the final Plan by 9 July 2025.
28. The EP report was not completed until early October 2025 which was a delay of five months. The EP report should have been available early May, so the Council could make its decision to issue by early June and issue a final plan by early July. The Council has already accepted it had taken longer than it should to complete the process due to a national shortage of EPs.
29. I acknowledge the national shortage of EPs caused the delay, however statutory guidance is clear regarding timeframes and the Council failed to meet this. This is fault in the form of service failure.
30. Once the Council received the EP report it should have issued Y’s final plan within eight weeks of this date and by 5 December. It did not do so until 14 January 2026, which is a further delay of almost six weeks, which is fault.
31. In total the Council delayed completing the statutory process by 27 weeks. This caused Miss X frustration and uncertainty and delayed her right of appeal to the SEND tribunal which she used shortly after receiving the final EHC Plan.
32. On balance, had the Council issued Y’s EHC plan without delay following receipt of EP advice it is likely, Y would have had access to the provision in their EHC Plan from 5 December 2025. The delays meant Y lost this opportunity.
33. Miss X said that due to the lack of action, she was forced to fund private assessments including paying for an Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) assessment. I have seen no evidence to suggest Miss X had informed the Council she was seeking any private reports or for it to agree to cover the costs of this. Miss X also did not raise this in her complaints to the Council.
34. The Council has already paid Miss X £500 and has offered to pay her a further £850. This is more than the Ombudsman could achieve for Miss X. So, I do not consider we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or that further investigation would lead to a different outcome.
35. We have investigated other similar complaints recently related to the EHC needs assessment process and made recommendations. The Council has an ongoing ‘action plan’ to address EP delays and reduce EHC needs assessment backlogs, I have not made further service improvement recommendations relating to this matter. We will monitor the Council’s ongoing work to reduce the backlog through our casework.

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Decision

36. I find fault causing injustice to Miss X and Y. The Council has already offered Miss X a suitable remedy and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome. I have completed my investigation on this basis.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman