Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about Miss X’s waiting time on the Council’s housing register. Part of the complaint is late. There is not enough evidence of fault causing significant injustice in the Council’s actions to justify investigating the rest of the complaint.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained that the Council led her to believe that her time in Band 2B would count towards her waiting time when she moved into Band 2A and that the Council’s communication about average waiting times was misleading.
2. She wants the Council to backdate her position in Band 2A to the date of her entry into Band 2B.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. 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
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

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

5. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

8. The Council’s published allocations scheme has three bands. Band 2 is separated into Band 2A and Band 2B. Applicants who have a housing need but do not meet the Council’s requirement to have lived in the area for three years enter Band 2B. The published scheme says that once the applicant has achieved three years’ residency, they move into Band 2A.
9. The Council sorts applicants within each band by the date they entered the band. This is their “preference date”. If an applicant moves up to a higher band, they get a new preference date.
10. Miss X joined the Council’s housing register in 2019. At that time, she did not meet the local residency criteria. She has a housing need and the Council placed her application into Band 2B. When she met the residency criteria in 2021, the Council changed her priority to Band 2A, with a new preference date.
11. Any complaint about the change in band and preference is late and there are no good reasons to exercise discretion to investigate it now. In any event, there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s actions to justify investigating. The Council must follow its published allocations policy, which it did in this case.
12. Miss X says the Council misled her to believe that the average waiting times on its website applied to all Band 2 applicants and not just those in Band 2A. The Council’s website provides average waiting times for “Band 2”. It does not specify whether this is just Band 2A or both 2A and 2B.
13. We will not investigate this part of the complaint. There is not enough injustice to Miss X from any fault in the Council’s communication to justify investigating. Although the website could be clearer, the information would not change Miss X’s priority for rehousing or the actual time she waits for a property. Miss X says had she known the first three years of bidding would not “count”, she would have moved. It is unlikely an investigation would be able to conclude that this is the case, given the factors involved in deciding to move home.

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Final decision

14. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because part of it is late and there is no good reason to exercise discretion to consider it now. There is not enough evidence of fault causing significant injustice to justify investigating the rest of the complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman