Summary: Mr X complained about the Council’s handling of his son’s Education, Health and Care needs assessment. He said delays in the process caused him distress and avoidable financial pressures. The Council accepted it was at fault for the delay in the assessment and apologised. The Council agreed to pay Mr X £200 to recognise the avoidable uncertainty its actions caused his family and review its procedures.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains about:
• the delay in his child’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan needs assessment process between September 2025 and December 2025; and
• the Council’s poor communications standards during the assessment.
2. He says the delay meant his child has missed out on education and SEN provision. Additionally, it caused him distress and financial hardship because his Personal Budget request was delayed and he had to pay for provision himself. He wants the Council to acknowledge the distress, lost education and financial hardship its actions caused to his family and to improve its service.

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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 an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. We make findings based on the balance of probabilities. This means that we will weigh up the available relevant evidence and base our findings on what we think was more likely to have happened.
5. The courts have established that if someone has appealed to the Tribunal, the law says we cannot investigate any matter which was part of, was connected to, or could have been part of, the appeal to the Tribunal. (R (on application of Milburn) v Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman [2023] EWCA Civ 207)
6. Due to the restrictions on our powers to investigate where there is an appeal right, there will be cases where there has been past injustice which neither we, nor the Tribunal, can remedy. The courts have found that the fact a complainant will be left without a remedy does not mean we can investigate a complaint. (R (ER) v Commissioner for Local Administration, ex parte Field) 1999 EWHC 754 (Admin). 
7. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).
8. 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)

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What I have and have not investigated

9. Some of Mr X’s complaint related to the Council’s actions with regards to his son’s EHC Plan after December 2025. I have not investigated this aspect as the Council issued a final EHC Plan in December 2025 and from that moment Mr X could appeal the Council’s decision to the SEND Tribunal.

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How I considered this complaint

10. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
11. Mr 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

12. 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. 

Timescales and process for EHC assessment 

13. Statutory guidance ‘Special educational needs and disability code of practice: 0 to 25 years’ (‘the Code’) sets out the process for carrying out EHC assessments and producing EHC Plans. The guidance is based on the Children and Families Act 2014 and the SEN Regulations 2014. It says the following: 

• 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 or the young person within six weeks. 
• If the council decides not to conduct an EHC needs assessment it must give the child’s parent or young person information about their right to appeal to the Tribunal.
• The process of 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 goes on to carry out an assessment, it must decide whether to issue an EHC Plan or refuse to issue a Plan within 16 weeks.
• If the council goes on to issue an EHC Plan, the whole process from the point when an assessment is requested until the final EHC Plan is issued must take no more than 20 weeks (unless certain specific circumstances apply);  
• Councils must give the child’s parent or the young person 15 days to comment on a draft EHC Plan and express a preference for an educational placement.
• The council must consult with the parent or young person’s preferred educational placement who should respond within 15 calendar days.
  (Delete irrelevant bullet points)

Advice and Information for EHC needs assessments

14. As part of the assessment, councils must gather advice from relevant professionals (SEND Regulation 6(1)). This includes: 

• the child’s educational placement; 
• medical advice and information from health care professionals involved with the child; 
• psychological advice and information from an Educational Psychologist (EP); 
• social care advice and information; 
• advice and information from any person requested by the parent or young person, where the council considers it reasonable; and 
• any other advice and information the council considers appropriate for a satisfactory assessment. 

15. The council must not seek further advice if it already has advice and “the person providing the advice, the local authority and the child’s parent or the young person are all satisfied that it is sufficient for the assessment process”. In making this decision the council and the person providing the advice should ensure the advice remains current.  
16. Those consulted have a maximum of six weeks to provide the advice. 

Personal Budgets

17. 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.
18. A child’s parent or the young person has the right to request a Personal Budget when the council has completed an EHC needs assessment and confirmed it will prepare an EHC Plan. They may also request a Personal Budget during a statutory review of an existing EHC Plan.
19. The final allocation of a Personal Budget must be sufficient to secure the agreed provision specified in the EHC Plan and must be set out as part of that provision.
20. If the council refuses a request for a direct payment, it must set out the reasons in writing and inform the child’s parent or the young person of their right to request a formal review of the decision.

Education other than at school (EOTAS)

21. For some children and young people, education in any setting would be inappropriate due to their special educational needs. This is often referred to education otherwise than at school or EOTAS.
22. If the Council agrees it would be inappropriate for any required special educational provision to be delivered in a school, it can agree to arrange for it to be delivered somewhere else, for example at home. The Council must arrange and pay for that provision.

What happened

23. Mr X asked the Council to carry out an EHC needs assessment for his son in late April 2025.
24. Almost eight weeks later, the Council asked the Educational Psychologist (EP) to visit Mr X’s son at school and submit a report to inform the EHC needs assessment. The EP was supposed to submit the report by the end of July 2025, but this did not happen until mid-August. Mr X chased the Council for an update and in turn it chased the EP for the report. Mr X told the Council it could use an old EP assessment to speed the process up.
25. In late August the Council decided it would issue an EHC Plan for Mr X’s son. The Council issued the draft EHC Plan in early September 2025. The following day Mr X sent his comments in and asked the Council for a personal budget and for his son to be educated away from school setting. Within 48 hours the Council told Mr X that it was considering his request for a personal budget and getting further professional advice.
26. After the Council received the professional’s advice it told Mr X that it would consult with schools before deciding Education Other than at School(EOTAS) was most appropriate for his son.
27. The Council should have issued the final EHC Plan by mid-September 2025, but it did not. Mr X complained about this to us within few days of the deadline, but we referred him back to complete the local complaints procedure, which he did.
28. The Council initially responded to his complaint in early October 2025. It accepted that the final EHC Plan was delayed and confirmed it was still considering his personal budget request. The Council also accepted that its communications with Mr X fell below the expected standards. The Council apologised for the delays.
29. At the end of the month the Council issued an updated draft EHC Plan and shared it with Mr X to get his comments.
30. In early November 2025 the Council met with Mr X to agree the changes to the draft EHC Plan that he wanted and agree provision to be funded by a personal budget. The Council confirmed this in writing few days later.
31. The following week after the meeting with Mr X the Council issued its final complaint response. It said that it was delayed issuing the final EHC Plan because of team changes but confirmed the final Plan will be issued following the meeting. The Council also said that it did not offer any other education because Mr X’s son had a place at a mainstream primary school which he was expected to attend.
32. Mr X told us that despite the Council agreeing to a personal budget, between November 2025 and January 2026 he funded the provision himself. In January the Council paid the money back to him. However Mr X said had to pay upfront a significant amount of money just before Christmas, which led to financial worries for his family.

What I found

EHC Needs Assessment

33. Generally, we expect councils to follow the timescales set out in the Code which is statutory guidance. We measure a council’s performance against the Code and we are likely to find fault where there are significant breaches of timescales.
34. Mr X asked for an EHC assessment at the end of April 2025. The Council decided to carry out an assessment and issued a decision letter in early June 2025, so it took about 6 weeks. There was a delay of one day as the Code allows councils six weeks from the date of a parental request.
35. The Code says EP reports should be completed within six weeks of a request. The SEN team requested EP advice nine days after the Council decided to assess Mr X’s son. This means the EP’s report should have been available by the end of July to comply with the six-week timeframe. The EP’s report was not completed until the end of August – a delay of five and a half weeks. The delay was not in line with the Code and was fault.
36. The Council also failed to complete the process and issue a final EHC Plan within 20 weeks from the date of Mr X’s request at the end of April 2025. There is no date specified in law by which the Council must issue the draft EHC Plan but for the final EHC Plan to be issued within 20 weeks, the draft EHC Plan should be issued by week 14 to allow for the consultation periods. The Council should have issued the final EHC Plan around the beginning of September 2025. The final EHC Plan was not available until December 2025. Even considering the team changes, and Mr X’s comments on the draft EHC Plan, this was still a delay of between three and four months which was fault. It had an adverse impact on Mr X because it delayed his right of appeal to the SEND Tribunal and caused avoidable distress and time and trouble chasing officers up. To avoid a loss of provision for his son, between November 2025 and January 2026 Mr X funded the provision the Council agreed to provide personal budget for. In January the Council repaid the money to Mr X. However, on balance, we consider Mr X would not have had to fund the provision himself had the Council issued the final EHC Plan within the 20-week timeline.

Communication standards

37. The Council accepted it was at fault because its communications with Mr X fell below the expected standards. This contributed to Mr X’s avoidable distress and frustration.

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Action

38. The Council will take the following action within four weeks from the date of my final decision:
• pay Mr X £200 to recognise the distress and uncertainty the Council’s fault has caused him; and
39. The Council will take the following action within three months from the date of my final decision:
• Review its EHC needs assessment process to maintain a proper oversight to ensure it is meeting the statutory timescales.
40. The Council will provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

41. I find fault causing injustice. The Council agreed to pay Mr X £200 to recognise the avoidable uncertainty its actions caused his family and review its procedures. Our investigation is now complete.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman