Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Miss X’s complaint that the Council listed her telephone number on its website as belonging to a local advice service. The Information Commissioner is better placed to determine if there was a breach of the General Data Protection Regulations and the personal injustice Miss X claims is not significant enough to warrant investigation.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Miss X, complains the Council listed her telephone number on its website as a contact number for a local advice service. As a result a number of individuals left messages on her voicemail, disclosing their personal information.

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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 must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint.

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

3. We normally expect someone to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner if they have a complaint about data protection. However, we may decide to investigate if we think there are good reasons. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I reviewed Miss X’s complaint and the Council’s responses to her emails. I shared my draft decision with Miss X and invited her comments.

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What I found

5. Miss X received a large number of telephone calls and voice messages on her landline over several months. She checked her voicemail in July 2019 and had over 60 messages from third parties disclosing sensitive and personal information.
6. Miss X searched for her telephone number online to find out why this was happening and found the Council’s website listed her number as belonging to a local advice service. She contacted the Council to complain and the Council investigated the issue and removed Miss X’s number from its website. Miss X remained unhappy and complained again but she says the Council did not respond to her further complaints.
7. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. As far as we can tell, when the Council listed the telephone number on its website it belonged to a local advice service and the issue arose as a result of her telephone provider’s reallocation of the number to Miss X. The Council has discussed the matter with the Information Commissioner and they have advised there was no breach of Miss X’s personal data. If Miss X disputes this, or wishes to pursue this point, she should report the matter to the Information Commissioner to investigate further. The Information Commissioner is better placed to determine whether there was a data breach and, if so, to recommend actions by the Council to address the issue.
8. While Miss X suffered some concern and frustration as a result of her telephone number appearing on the Council’s website and the calls and voice messages she subsequently received, this is not a significant enough injustice to warrant investigation by the Ombudsman as it is unlikely we would recommend a further remedy. The Council removed Miss X’s telephone number from its website promptly and the issue is now resolved.
9. Miss X is also unhappy with the way the Council has dealt with her complaint. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We do not therefore propose to investigate this issue separately.

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Final decision

10. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because the Information Commissioner is better placed to consider the substantive issue about data protection and the matter has not caused Miss X significant injustice for which we would recommend a remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman