Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the way the Council handled his Right to Buy application. This is because it is reasonable to expect Mr X to have used the legal remedies available to him.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr X, wants to buy his council house through the Right to Buy. He says the Council has disadvantaged him by:

• inflating its valuations of its properties,
• creating unfair lease terms by excessively increasing services charges due to major works,
• failing to comply with its complaint procedures,
• accusing him of making fraudulent claims for one year’s worth of rent refund.

Mr X says this has caused him inconvenience, delay and extra costs.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 a ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if an alternative statutory process was, or is available, that would address the issue, and we believe it is reasonable to expect the person to use, or have used, that process. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. The 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

4. I have considered the information provided by Mr X and the Council’s responses. I gave Mr X the opportunity to comment on my draft decision.

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What I found

Background

5. Part V of the Housing Act 1985 (‘the Act’) sets out the Right to Buy process.
6. The Act allows tenants to serve an ‘initial notice of delay’ form if they consider the Council is holding up the sale. The Council must then either move the sale along within a month, or send a counter notice to the tenant. The counter notice will explain what action the Council has already taken, or explain why it cannot progress the sale.
7. If the Council does not reply within a month, the tenant can complete an ‘operative notice of delay’ form. Any rent the tenant pays while waiting for the Council’s response can be taken off the sale price.
8. If a Council still does not act on notices of delay, a tenant may take their dispute to the County Court, under section 181 of the Housing Act. This section provides for the Court to decide any question about the Right to Buy process.
9. The Act also provides a right for tenants to ask the District Valuer (DV) for a determination of the value of their property if they disagree with the Council’s valuation. The DV’s decision is then binding on both parties.
10. We have no jurisdiction to investigate complaints about DV’s.

What happened

11. Mr X applied to buy his council house through the Right to Buy in 2019. In August 2019, the Council issued its purchase price. Mr X did not agree with its valuation and the methods it used to value his council house and appealed to the DV.
12. The DV did not change the Council’s valuation. Mr X asked the DV to review its decision. It decided to reduce the valuation and informed the Council. The Council issued a new purchase price in April 2020. It also provided an estimate of the expected service charges for the next five years if the property is sold.
13. Mr X complained through the Council’s three stage complaints process. He said its method for valuing his and other properties was wrong and the expected service charges were excessive. In his stage three complaint, Mr X also added the Council had failed to comply with its complaints process and had accused him of fraudulent claims. As a remedy for these matters, Mr X asked the Council to refund a year’s worth of rent and apply service charge rates from 2017.
14. In response the Council explained its valuation process and said the DV found its valuation for Mr X’s home to be reasonable. It also told Mr X how it calculated service charges.
15. The Council acknowledged it had only responded informally to Mr X’s stage one complaint as there was a fault in its system for receiving stage two complaints which cause some misunderstanding, and it was two days late with its stage two response.
16. The Council offered Mr X an apology and £100 compensation for the inconvenience caused during the complaints process. However, it refused Mr X’s request for a year’s worth of rent refund and said it had met its obligations under the Right to Buy process. But Mr X said the Council had caused delays and he remained unhappy with its decisions.

Assessment

17. The role of the Ombudsman is to consider if there has been fault by councils which has caused the complainant a personal injustice. Mr X complained the Council has a general practice of inflating property valuations in Right to Buy cases. But we must focus on how the Council has dealt with Mr X’s particular case and his own personal injustice.
18. In addition, we are not a general appeals body regarding Council’s decisions, and before deciding whether to investigate a complaint, we need to consider if any alternative remedies are or were available to the complainant under the law.
19. In particular we normally expect a purchaser under the Right to Buy scheme to use the processes and options available under the Act, which refer to above. They are the specific methods provided by Parliament to deal with Right to Buy disputes.
20. So if Mr X felt the Council was unreasonably delaying the Right to Buy process, it seems he could have used the notice of delay procedure set out in the Act, which potentially could have given him a right to have his rent payments offset against the purchase price of his property. In the circumstances I do not see we could fault the Council if it suggested Mr X’s claim for a year’s rent was not valid.
21. Mr X evidently used his right under the Act to refer the Council’s valuation to the DV. So he was able to address this part of his complaint using the remedy provided to him under the law. In the circumstances we have no reason to become involved in this matter. Mr X complained about the time taken to go through the re-valuation process. But we have no power to consider complaints about unreasonable delay by the DV.
22. Mr X complained the Council’s estimate of service charges he may have to pay over the next five years is excessive. But I do not see that this is a matter of fault we can pursue. In particular we cannot make a finding about fault regarding something the Council may or may not do in future. If Mr X actually receives a bill for service charges which he considers unreasonable in future, he would need to make a complaint or pursue an appeal at that time.
23. The Council has acknowledged some fault in the way it responded to Mr X’s complaints. But I consider the Council’s apology and offer of compensation are a suitable remedy for any injustice Mr X was caused in this respect and, as a result, I do not see that we need to pursue this matter any further.

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Final decision

24. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint about the way the Council handled his Right to Buy application. This is because it is reasonable to expect for Mr X to have used the legal remedies available to him.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman