Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the invoice the Council issued in relation to his previous temporary accommodation. Only the courts could determine if he is liable to pay the invoice and we could not achieve the outcome Mr X wants.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained the Council asked him to contribute to the cost of repairs and redecoration after he left his former temporary accommodation. Mr X says he is not liable to pay and that the Council has treated him unfairly.
2. Mr X said the Council has suspended his housing register application due to the housing-related debt, which means he cannot bid to secure suitable housing. He says this means his family remain in unsuitable housing.
3. Mr X wants the Council to withdraw the invoice.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
5. 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)
6. 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 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))

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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
8. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

Invoice for disrepair

9. The Council invoiced Mr X £5,000 towards the cost of repairs and redecoration after he left his former temporary accommodation. At stage 1 of its complaints process, it said the landlord had incurred costs of £8,800 for works needed before the property could be relet. However, after considering Mr X’s comments, it reduced the invoice to £2,884, which equated to five weeks’ rent.
10. Mr X remained unhappy and asked the Council to consider the complaint at stage 2 of its process, but it failed to do so.
11. We cannot say whether Mr X is liable to pay the invoice issued. This is a legal matter that only the courts could determine. Further, we could not achieve the outcome Mr X wants, which is to ask the Council to withdraw the invoice. Therefore, we will not consider this part of the complaint further.
12. We would not usually investigate a Council’s complaints handling unless we are investigating the underlying complaint. There is no good reason for us to take a different approach here.

Bidding suspension

13. The Council’s allocations scheme says housing register applications will be suspended for six months where the applicant has a housing-related debt of £500 or more. After that, applicants can only bid if they have maintained a repayment plan for at least six months.
14. My understanding is that Mr X disputes the invoice and has therefore not agreed a repayment plan. The Council’s decision to suspend bidding is in line with its published scheme and there is insufficient evidence of fault in its decision-making to justify further investigation.
15. Whilst the Council could make a discretionary decision not to apply this restriction, we could not require it to do so. In any case, Council records seen show it is actively seeking a suitable property to discharge its housing duty and has said it intends to make a direct offer of housing if suitable social housing is identified. In the circumstances, further investigation by us would not lead to a worthwhile outcome.

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Final decision

16. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because only the courts can determine whether he is liable to pay the invoice. There is insufficient evidence of fault in relation to the suspension of bidding on the housing register application to justify our involvement.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman