Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of a premises license transfer. There is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council, and the courts are better placed to consider the complainant’s claimed financial losses.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council wrongly crossed out his own name on a premises license transfer consent form, and issued the license in his company’s name instead. When the Council later discovered the company had been dissolved, it said the premises license had therefore lapsed.
2. Mr X thinks the Council should reinstate his license, and compensate him for £25,000 - £30,0000 loss of sales he says he incurred.

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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 can 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. So, we do not start 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
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

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

5. The also law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered:
• information provided by Mr X and the Council, which included their complaint correspondence.
• the Licensing Act 2003.
• the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. I appreciate Mr X is very unhappy that the Council says he must apply for a new premises license, despite his business having traded for several years prior to this.
8. But there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council in the way it has handled Mr X’s license, so we will not start an investigation. In reaching this view, I am mindful that:
• as the transfer of the license occurred in 2016, an investigation is unlikely to be able to establish who crossed out Mr X’s own name on the transfer consent form and replaced it with his company’s name.
• the application form, which accompanied the transfer consent form, had Mr X’s company named as the applicant and the form was signed by Mr X in his capacity as a director of the company.
• the premises license was issued in the name of Mr X’s company, and he did not challenge this at the time.
9. I also note the Council has offered to waive the fee for Mr X to apply for a new premises license in his own name. An investigation by the Ombudsman is unlikely to achieve anything more meaningful for Mr X, as we cannot direct the Council to reinstate the old license in his own name, and the courts would be better placed to consider the claimed financial impact on his business.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault in the way the Council handled the license transfer, and the courts are better placed to consider his claim for financial compensation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman