Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s handling of private housing disrepair reports from his landlord. The Council has upheld the complaint and agreed to remedy Mr X’s injustice by paying him £200.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the Council’s handling of reports of private housing disrepair by his tenant. He said the Council did not respond to him in a timely manner and was in breach of data protection rules when it sent the tenant an improvement notice with Mrs X’s name and address on it. Mr X said the failings caused him frustration and he was put to avoided expense visiting the property.

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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 provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions an organisation has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)
3. The Information Commissioner's Office considers complaints about data protection and freedom of information. Its decision notices may be appealed to the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights). So where we receive complaints about freedom of information, we normally consider it reasonable to expect the person to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner.

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by the @complainant @and the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. In April 2023, Mr X’s tenant, Mr Y, reported disrepair in their private rented property. The Council contacted the letting agent asking them to investigate and respond. Mr Y said the letting agent had not addressed the issues, so the Council wrote to the lettings agent to say it had decided to carry out an inspection of the property. It carried out an inspection in May 2023, at which it identified category 1 and 2 hazards under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS). It contacted the lettings agent to inform them of the outcome of the inspection and the lettings agent passed that information on to Mr X.
7. In July 2023, the Council issued an improvement notice. Some time later, Mr Y moved out of the property. Mr X raised concerns about the process and outcome, but the Council did not respond.
8. If we investigated the complaint, it is likely we would find the Council at fault. This is because, in its final complaint response, it accepted its communication was poor, that the officer dealing with the case did not keep adequate records, and that the drafting of the improvement notice was poor. It apologised, and asked another officer to inspect the property. This was appropriate action for the Council to take. However, this did not remedy the avoidable time and trouble caused to Mr X pursuing the matter. We therefore asked the Council to consider a payment of £200 to remedy this. It agreed to make that payment within one month of the date of this decision. On that basis, we will not investigate further.
9. The Council did not accept it had breached data protection rules when sending the improvement notice to Mr Y. It would be reasonable for Mr X to raise this matter with the Information Commissioner’s Office if he wishes to pursue that part of his complaint. We will not consider that matter further.

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Final decision

10. We have upheld this complaint because the Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by providing a proportionate remedy for the injustice caused to Mr X.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman