London Borough of Lewisham (23 003 765)

Category : Housing > Council house sales and leaseholders

Decision : Closed after initial enquiries

Decision date : 09 Jul 2023

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision to cancel the complainant’s application to purchase their home under the right to buy scheme. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council.

The complaint

  1. The complainant, who I will call Ms X, complains about the Council’s decision to cancel her application to purchase her home under the right to buy scheme. Ms X says the Council failed to inform her of its decision and says the Council should reopen her application.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

  1. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
  2. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

  1. There is a strict procedure for right to buy application. The process begins with completion of an application form. If accepted, the Council must make an offer within eight weeks of accepting the application for a freehold property, or twelve weeks for a leasehold residence. The offer will set out the price of the property, the years of tenancy and the discount applied.
  2. The applicant has up to twelve weeks to accept the offer. If the applicant fails to respond, the Council will issue a reminder giving a further 28 days to reply. If the applicant does not accept, the Council may issue a notice to withdraw the offer. The applicant must then re-apply if they later want to buy.
  3. Ms X submitted a right to buy application in July 2018 and the Council made an offer. In August 2020, the Council sent a reminder to Ms X, giving her 28 days to reply. After no reply the Council says it sent a letter in the post informing her that it had withdrawn the offer and that she would need to re-apply.
  4. I will not investigate Ms X’s complaint. There is no evidence that Ms X responded to the Council’s reminder within 28 days and so there is no evidence of fault in the Council’s decision to withdraw the offer. Ms X says she did not receive the letter informing her that the offer had been withdrawn, but this may be because Royal Mail failed to deliver it. We cannot hold the Council responsible for such an error, and I have no other independent means of establishing why Ms X did not receive her letter.

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Final decision

  1. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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