Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about a Council‑owned theatre not refunding or reissuing her and her son’s tickets to one of its shows, and its contacts with her on the matter. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision to justify us investigating. We will not investigate councils’ contacts and complaint handling where we are not investigating the issue giving rise to the correspondence and complaint.

The complaint

1. Ms X bought tickets for a theatre show for her and her young son from his school. The theatre is run by the Council. Her son had an accident on the day of the show and she had to take him to hospital.
2. Ms X complains the Council:
1. refused to allow her to rearrange their theatre visit for a different day;
2. failed to reply to her emails and she needed to contact many different staff.
3. Ms X says she is a struggling single parent, and she and her son missed the show. She wants the theatre to rearrange the booking so her son does not miss out.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information from Ms X, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Ms X booked her and her son’s tickets through his school, not directly with the theatre. The Council says the tickets Ms X had did not include any ‘ticket protection’ payment. This is a service available at an extra cost which entitles the buyer to a full refund should they be unable to attend the show for which they have booked.
7. It is unfortunate Ms X and her son, for good reason, could not go to the show. I recognise Ms X would like the Council to make an exception as they missed the show because of her son’s unforeseen accident. But the ‘ticket protection’ service is there, at additional cost to the buyer, to provide a full refund should someone be unable to attend because of that kind of unexpected event. Ms X’s tickets did not have the ‘ticket protection’ included or reflected in their price, so they did not entitle her under the theatre’s policies to the refund she seeks. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision not to refund or reissue Ms X’s show tickets here to justify us investigating.
8. If Ms X believes the school told her the tickets she bought from them included ‘ticket protection’, she may wish to contact the school about the matter.
9. Ms X says she had to contact various theatre staff members and they did not reply to her emails. We do not investigate councils’ contacts and complaint handling in isolation where we are not investigating the core issue which gave rise to the complaint. It is not a good use of our resources to do so. That limitation applies here so we will not investigate this part of the complaint.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to warrant us investigating; and
• we do not investigate councils’ contacts and complaint handling where we are not investigating the issue giving rise to those contacts and the complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman