Summary: We will not investigate this complaint that the Council did not respond to Mr X’s email about a benefit fraud issue as it is unlikely we can change the outcome of the complaint or achieve any meaningful outcome for Mr X. We will not investigate Mr X’s associated complaints as I do not consider he was caused a level of injustice, from any Council fault, significant enough to warrant our further involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council failed to respond to an email he sent to it in August 2021, requesting someone telephone him about a benefit fraud issue and that a councillor he contacted about this also failed to help him. Mr X complains the Council discriminated against him when he wanted to complain about these issues as it directed him to use its online services. Mr X says he cannot use these due to his disabilities.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. 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, or any fault has not caused significant injustice to the person who complained, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

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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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Background

6. Mr X sent an email to the housing benefit section of the Council in August 2021 asking for someone to call him regarding a possible benefit fraud issue. Mr X received an automatic reply saying his email would be responded to but no response was provided. Mr X also contacted a councillor about this issue but again says that he received no response.
7. Mr X’s concern was that he was receiving housing benefit for a service which he says wasn’t being provided by his landlord as the communal light in question was not working, nor was the communal electricity meter. Mr X was concerned as to how this impacted him in respect of his housing benefit claim.
8. Mr X complained to the Council about not having received a response from housing benefit or his local councillor. Mr X is disabled and due to this, struggles to use online services. Mr X complains that in dealing with his complaint, the Council, despite knowing this, responded by sending him links to its webpages where Mr X could progress his complaint. Mr X says this caused him unnecessary, additional distress.
9. In its complaint responses to Mr X, the Council said it had no record of his email from August 2021. I sent the Council a copy of Mr X’s email and the Council’s auto-response. The Council acknowledged that the auto-response would have been misleading to Mr X. However, the Council explains that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is now responsible for dealing with housing benefit fraud and that the Council no longer has any capacity to do so.
10. In its complaint responses, the Council acknowledged that Mr X had made other contact with it about his housing benefit and service charges. The Council had responded by confirming that no direct deduction was made from Mr X’s housing benefit for the service charge. It said that as the charge is communal, it is eligible to be covered by Mr X’s housing benefit claim. The Council advised Mr X that any complaints about this matter would need to be made to his landlord.
11. The Council assessed Mr X’s complaint about his local councillor and decided that no further action was warranted. The Council explained the councillor had received Mr X’s email but due to a backlog of matters to attend to, she had overlooked it. The Council concluded that the lack of response was purely inadvertent.
12. Mr X was unhappy with this response as he said the Council’s procedure for dealing with councillor complaints was out of date.

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My assessment

13. I do not consider it would be in the public interest to investigate how the Council dealt with Mr X’s email from August 2021, given the time that has elapsed since Mr X first encountered this issue. In addition, while it would have helped if the Council had advised Mr X at the time that his concerns should be raised with the DWP, I do not consider on balance that the injustice caused to Mr X from this is sufficient to warrant our further involvement or that we could achieve any meaningful outcome for him now, by investigating.
14. There is some indication that the Council did contact Mr X with instructions to make his complaints on line and I recognise that this caused Mr X some distress and further effort. However, the Council did ultimately accept Mr X’s complaints as he made them and as such, I do not consider that any fault by the Council in this regard resulted in Mr X being caused injustice to a degree that would warrant an investigation. In its complaint responses, the Council also gave assurances to Mr X that he could make any future complaints over the telephone or by email/letter rather than being required to fill in online forms.

15. The Council considered Mr X’s councillor complaint and decided that further action was not warranted. I will ask the Council to attend to the review of its policy, if it is overdue, but I do not consider that even if it is, that it is likely that this would have caused Mr X a significant injustice or that it means a different decision would have been reached.
16. For these reasons, we will not investigate Mr X’s complaints.

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Final decision

17. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we cannot achieve any meaningful outcome for him and any fault by the Council has not resulted in Mr X being caused significant injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman