Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision to close a housing application when the applicant failed to respond to a renewal review. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council’s decision to close her housing application. she says she didn’t receive a renewal reminder in time because of a lack of space in her online account and because she had changed her address and email address so any letter would not have been received at her new address. She wants the Council to re-instate her application from her new address with the original date.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council. I have also considered the Council’s housing allocations policy.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Miss X applied to the Council’s housing register and was awarded Band B priority. She was bidding on vacancies as they became available on the choice-based housing register but in October 2025 she discovered that her account had been closed. She contacted the Council and was told that she had failed to respond to its renewal review and that her account had been closed according to its allocations policy.
6. Miss X told the Council that she moved to a different address in June and that she had also changed her email address so any letters or emails would not have been received. The Council told her that it is a requirement of the policy to inform the Housing Team of any changes in circumstances such as her address and that failure to do so risks disqualification or prosecution under the Housing Act legislation. She had been bidding on vacancies since June using her old circumstances and any offers which may have resulted would have been withdrawn due to incorrect information.
7. Miss X submitted a new application based on her current circumstances but because this was received after the closure of the original application the registration date was only applied from December 2025. The new application was subsequently assessed and she was awarded the same banding, Band B.
8. We will not investigate this complaint. Housing applicants are advised when they apply that they are required to respond to reviews of their accounts and to inform the Council of any change in circumstances. This is important because the law requires it and because failure to do so could result in offers being made to applicants who have changed circumstances and may be ineligible for an offer. This would cause injustice to other applicants who may have been able to bid successfully.
9. 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, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision the organisation made.
10. We may not find fault with a council’s assessment of a housing application or a housing applicant’s priority if it has carried this out in line with its published allocations scheme.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision to close a housing application when the applicant failed to respond to a renewal review. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman