London Borough of Hounslow (25 013 191)
Category : Other Categories > Leisure and culture
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 19 Oct 2025
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s failure to respond to Mrs X’s complaint. This is because an investigation would not provide a worthwhile outcome.
The complaint
- Mrs X complained the Council failed to contact her regarding a complaint she made about her an incident involving her son.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- 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:
- any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
- there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by Mrs X and the Council.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- Mrs X complained the Council failed to contact her after she made a complaint regarding an incident that involved her son at a local swimming pool.
- The Council apologised for Mrs X’s upset. The Council investigated and found that the general manager on site had attempted to call Mrs X numerous times but had been unsuccessful. The Council confirmed that all safety protocols had been followed during the incident.
- Mrs X remains unhappy with the Council’s actions and wants us to find it fault. The evidence shows the Council investigated the matter and confirmed it had followed the correct protocol during the incident. The Council advised that it had tried to contact Mrs X but was unable to get through to her. The Council apologised to Mrs X in its final complaint response. There is no way of knowing why the Council’s attempts to contact Mrs X were unsuccessful but ultimately an investigation into this matter would not achieve anything worthwhile for Mrs X.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because an investigation would not achieve anything worthwhile for Mrs X.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman