Summary: Mr X complains about how the Council managed his contact with it. He says the decision to restrict his contact affected his ability to raise issues in an emergency. The Ombudsman does find fault with how the Council managed Mr X’s contact however, this did not cause Mr X significant injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I refer to as Mr X, complains about how the Council managed his contact arrangements.

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What I have investigated

2. I have investigated the issues around the Council’s contact arrangements with Mr X. I have set out at the end of this statement what I have not investigated.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. As part of this investigation:
• I considered the complaint raised and the Council’s response.
• I made enquiries to the Council and considered the information it provided.
• I considered the Ombudsman’s guidance to Councils about managing complainant behaviour.
• I sent a draft of this decision to Mr X and the Council for comments.

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What I found

Council’s policy on dealing with persistent complainants

7. The Council’s policy says the Council will try and ensure a persistent complainant has one main contact within the Council. This should be someone from within the relevant service area who is familiar with the issues the complainant raises.
8. If a complainant keeps telephoning either to discuss an existing complaint or to make a new complaint, and this is proving time consuming and disruptive, it may be reasonable to ask them to put their concerns in writing. If the problem persists, it may be reasonable to tell the complainant the Council will, for a set period, not accept telephone calls and only deal with the complainant in writing.
9. The policy also says when a complainant is persistently contacting the Council about a specific issue, it is that subject matter only that the Council agrees not to discuss further, in the absence of any new information. The Council should ensure the complainant is able to continue to contact the Council about other concerns they wish to raise.

What happened

10. Mr X received a care package from the Council however, this was due to end at the beginning of July 2019. Mr X also had a named point of contact at the Council who he could discuss his concerns with about his care package. Mr X put in a formal complaint to the Council about how the Council’s social care department had treated him.
11. During June 2019 Mr X telephoned and emailed the Council many times about his and his mother’s care package. He also made numerous claims about the conduct of staff members.
12. The Council emailed Mr X in late June 2019 to warn him about his conduct and reminded him he had a named point of contact to discuss is care issues with. The Council also visited Mr X’s property to carry out an assessment of his needs. The notes from this say Mr X left when the Council officer was present and drove off in his lorry.
13. Mr X made further contact with the Council via email and telephone about the Council’s social care department. In a two week period this amounted to over 60 calls and on one day Mr X called the Council over 20 times. Mr X mentioned in some of his contact he would set up an Internet page about the Council and he felt the Council were abusing him regarding his care needs.
14. At the end of July 2019, the Council provided Mr X with a formal response to his complaint about the social care department. In its response the Council told Mr X it is imposing a contact restriction due to the amount of contact received from him via telephone and in writing. The Council told Mr X outside of any emergency situations, he could only telephone it once every 10 working days. The Council would read emails received from Mr X but in the absence of new information would only log these and not provide an acknowledgment. Any new issues the Council would respond to within 10 working days. The Council told Mr X it would review this agreement in two months.
15. Over the coming days Mr X telephoned the Council many times. On 1 August 2019 the Council wrote to Mr X to tell him because of his further persistent contact he could only contact the Council by email. The Council told Mr X it would review this arrangement at the end of September 2019. Urgent issues he raised in emails would be actioned immediately whereas non-urgent issues would be responded to within 10 working days.
16. On the same day Mr X made over 20 consecutive telephone calls to the Council. He also emailed a Councillor saying he will contact him at home. Mr X also sent further emails to the Council and wrote on its social medial page.
17. Mr X continued to contact the Council including his named contact, the CEO and a Councillor on his home telephone number. The Council held a meeting at the beginning of November 2019 where it considered issuing Mr X a harassment warning notice would be suitable to manage his contact. The Council decided against doing this when it received notice the Ombudsman was investigating Mr X’s complaint.

Analysis

18. The role of the Ombudsman is to consider whether a Council was at fault in what it did. I cannot however change a decision properly taken on its own merits by an officer in the exercise of their professional judgement. This applies even if Mr X disagrees with the decisions taken.
19. The Council took the decision to restrict Mr X’s contact after receiving an excessive amount of telephone and email correspondence. The Council told Mr X in writing it would restrict his contact to one telephone call every 10 working days, outside of emergency situations. Mr X was also able to email the Council. A few days later the Council decided to further restrict Mr X’s contact to email only given the excessive amount of telephone calls it received from him between 29 July and 1 August 2019.
20. I do not find fault with the Council’s decision to restrict Mr X’s contact. It based this decision on volume and content of communication it received from Mr X. The Council also made provision available for Mr X to contact it in emergencies in line with its policy.
21. The Council told Mr X it would review his contact restriction by the end of September 2019 however, it did not review or update Mr X about the restrictions. This is fault. I accept the Council said it did not review and tell Mr X about his contact restriction due to his continued communication in breach of the restrictions. However, it would be reasonable to expect the Council to tell Mr X at the end of September 2019, of its plans for his contact going forward.
22. I now must decide whether this fault caused a significant injustice to Mr X. He knew contact restrictions were in place and from the evidence available he continued to contact the Council regularly and in breach of these restrictions.
23. The Council told the Ombudsman it was in fact considering whether to serve a harassment warning notice on Mr X given his breach of his contact restrictions. On balance I am satisfied the Council would not have removed the contact restrictions at the end of September 2019, therefore I do not consider Mr X has suffered any significant injustice.

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Final decision

24. I have completed my investigation and found fault by the Council, however this did not cause Mr X significant injustice. Therefore, no remedy is recommended.

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

25. I did not investigate Mr X’s concerns about his care package with the Council. This is because the Ombudsman has already investigated this complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman