Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about the Council’s handling of her homelessness case. It was reasonable for her to ask the Council for a review.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains about the Council’s handling of her homelessness case. She says the Council:
• did not provide her alternative accommodation it previously promised to provide her;
• unreasonably refused her out of time review request and crisis payment application; and
• mishandled her complaint.

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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
• it would be reasonable for the person to ask for a council review or appeal; or

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

3. We will not usually investigate complaint handling if we are not investigating the rest of the complaint. This is because there is not usually enough injustice to justify us doing so. We collect information about particularly poor complaint handling practice and report this back to organisations. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), section 34B(8))

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by Ms X and the Council.
5. I also considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Ms X complains the Council promised to provide her alternative accommodation before her eviction. She says the Council did not do this, leaving her and her family street homeless following her eviction in July 2025.
7. The evidence I have seen shows:
• In May 2024, the Council told Ms X it would provide her alternative accommodation before she left her temporary accommodation. Ms X was provided with alternative accommodation in October 2024, after the Council could not secure repairs at the temporary accommodation.
• In November 2024, the Council decided that Ms X was homeless but not in priority need. It advised her to arrange alternative accommodation for herself and gave her 21 days to request a review if she disagreed with the decision.
8. I do not consider the Council's statement in May 2024 amounted to an ongoing promise to provide accommodation after it decided Ms X was not in priority need. The Council had no further duty to provide accommodation following that decision. If Ms X disagreed with the decision, she could have asked for a review, but I have not seen evidence that she did so. As it was reasonable for her to ask the Council for a review, I will not investigate this aspect of her complaint.

Refusal of out of time review request and crisis payment application

9. The Council says it has no evidence that it received an out of time review request from Ms X about its decision that she was not in priority need. Therefore, there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to justify us investigating.
10. The Council refused Ms X’s crisis payment application because she was not eligible as she was not in receipt of a qualifying benefit. The decision is in line with the Council’s crisis payment policy. There is not enough evidence of fault to justify us investigating.

Complaint handling

11. Ms X also complains about the Council’s handling of her complaint. She says the accommodation manager signed off the complaint response, which she considers a conflict of interest. She also says the Council addressed her incorrectly.
12. As a public funded body, we must be careful how we use our resources. As we are not investigating the substantive matters of this complaint, it is not a good use of public resources to investigate the complaint handling in isolation.
13. In any event, having reviewed the complaint responses I do not consider that the accommodation manager’s involvement created a conflict of interest or that there is evidence of bias in how the complaint was handled. I also do not consider that the error in how Ms X was addressed has caused her significant enough injustice to justify us investigating.
14. Although we have decided not to investigate the complaint handling, we collect information about poor complaint handling practice and report this back to organisations.

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Final decision

15. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because it was reasonable for her to ask for a review of the Council’s homelessness decision, there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s refusal of her crisis payment application and it is not a good use of public resources to investigate the complaint handling in isolation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman