Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint that the Council failed to act on her reports of noise nuisance caused by her neighbour since 2020. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making. Furthermore, part of the complaint is late, and an investigation into the remaining issues would not achieve any additional outcome.

The complaint

1. Ms X complained the Council failed to act on her reports of noise nuisance caused by her neighbour since 2020. Ms X said the Council also failed to communicate with her about the matter.
2. Ms X said the matter caused her distress and frustration.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. 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)
5. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information provided by the complainant.
7. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

Back to top

My assessment

Matters older than 12 months

8. Ms X complained about noise nuisance from her neighbour starting in 2020. Ms X did not complain to the Ombudsman until February 2025. Therefore, matters before February 2024 are late.
9. The Council’s stage two complaint response was two months late. Therefore, the Ombudsman will exercise discretion to consider matters two months before Ms X brought her complaint to us. This means we will consider matters after December 2023.
10. I have seen no good reasons Ms X could not have complained about matters before December 2023 sooner; therefore, we will not investigate matters before that date.

Matters between December 2023 and January 2025

11. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about how the Council considered her reports of statutory noise nuisance. This is because, in its complaint response, the Council told Ms X it decided the issues she reported did not amount to a statutory nuisance. To make that determination, it:
• installed noise monitoring equipment;
• visited Ms X at her home five times between August and September 2024 to listen to the noise; and
• considered Ms X’s audio recordings, 74 of which were made between August and September 2024.
12. While Ms X was unhappy with the noise and behaviour of her neighbours, the Council decided there was no evidence of a statutory nuisance.
13. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong.
14. There is insufficient evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process to warrant an investigation by the Ombudsman. Therefore, we will not investigate this complaint.

Poor communication

15. We will not investigate the Council’s communication with Ms X. This is because, in its complaint response, the Council accepted its communication was not sufficient. It apologised to Ms X and explained service improvements it would implement to prevent recurrence of the fault.
16. An investigation by the Ombudsman is unlikely to achieve any further outcome, and so we will not investigate this complaint.

Back to top

Final decision

17. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault, part of the complaint is late, and because an investigation is unlikely to achieve any additional outcome for the remainder.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman