Summary: Mr X complains about the Council’s handling of his complaint about him being sent a letter accusing him of parking on grass verges in the area. The Ombudsman will not investigate as Mr X is not caused a significant injustice from the Council sending him the letter, or from how it dealt with his complaint.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council sent him a letter, accusing him, or visitors to his home, of parking on grass verges and causing damage. Mr X complains the Council has failed to investigate the competency of the officer who sent Mr X the letter and has failed to deal properly with his complaint about this matter.

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I have considered what Mr X said in his complaint and the Council’s complaint response to Mr X, which it has sent to me. I have written to Mr X with my draft decision on the complaint and I have considered the comments he made in response.

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What I found

4. Mr X complains he received a letter from the Council addressed to the ‘owner/occupier’. The letter said that the owner/occupier, or visitors to the address, had been parking illegally on grass verges in the area, which was resulting in mud being dragged into the road and causing a safety hazard.
5. Mr X questions the competency of the officer that sent the letter to him and two other properties. Mr X says there was/is no evidence that he, or visitors to his home, have been parking on the verges. Mr X says that if the officer had properly assessed the site, it would have been obvious to him which property was responsible. Despite this, Mr X says no letter was sent to that property.
6. Mr X complains the Council has failed to properly investigate the actions of its officer or comment on his competency. Mr X also complains the Council has failed to properly respond to his concerns that the letter is libelous and has refused to escalate his complaint to Stage 2 of its procedure.
7. The Council told Mr X that a standard letter was sent to three properties after it received a complaint from a member of the public about a damaged verge. The Council officer involved, acknowledged in a telephone conversation with Mr X, that the letter was accusatory and apologised to him for the wording of the letter. In its complaint response to Mr X, the Council also formally apologised to him for any distress caused by it.
8. The Council has reviewed and amended the wording of the standard letter as a result of Mr X’s complaint.

Assessment

9. Mr X has clearly been offended by the Council’s letter. However, from our perspective, the injustice caused to Mr X by it is not at a level that would warrant our involvement. We will not therefore investigate why the officer sent the letter to Mr X. It is also unlikely that any investigation by us would change the outcome of Mr X’s complaint.
10. We will not investigate how the Council dealt with Mr X’s complaint. It is not a good use of our resources to investigate how a complaint was handled when we will not investigate the substantive issue.

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Final decision

11. My decision is that the Ombudsman should not investigate this complaint. This is because Mr X is not caused a level of injustice that would warrant the Ombudsman’s involvement and it is unlikely any investigation would change the outcome of the complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman