Service improvements

West Northamptonshire Council

Showing service improvements between 1 April 2022 and 31 March 2023

Find out more about service improvements

When we find fault, we can recommend improvements to systems and processes where they haven’t worked properly, so that others do not suffer from these same problems in future. Common examples are policy changes; procedural reviews; and staff training. Service improvements from decisions are published for 5 years and those from reports are published for 10 years.

Showing 1 - 5 of 5 cases with service improvements

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Downloads the current filtered list of service improvement decisions for West Northamptonshire Council as a CSV file.

  • West Northamptonshire Council (22 004 125)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 02-Mar-2023

    Summary

    We found fault with the care provided to Mrs H by the Trust and West Northants Council when she started to display challenging behaviour due to dementia. We also found fault with the actions of the Approved Mental Health Practitioner service acting on behalf of North Northants Council as it did not properly involve Mr H in the Mental Health Act Assessment process even though he was Mrs H’s nearest relative. These organisations will apologise to Mr and Mrs H and pay them a financial remedy. They will also take action to prevent similar problems occurring in future.

    Service improvements

    Within three months of our final decision, the Council will write to the Ombudsmen to explain what action it will take to ensure the care home has a robust protocol in place for the administration of medications. This should include a process for receiving, storing, administering and recording medications. It should also include a process for recording specialist advice.

  • West Northamptonshire Council (22 003 130)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 23-Nov-2022

    Summary

    Mrs D complained the Council failed to properly consider Miss X’s disability related expenditure for her care cost contributions since Autumn 2020 and caused delays in responding to her requests. The Council agreed some expenditure should have been included, and it caused delays in responding to Mrs D’s requests. It agreed to apologise to Miss X and Mrs D, credit Miss X’s account with the reduced contribution amount to September 2020 and make payment to Mrs D to acknowledge the distress this caused.

    Service improvements

    The Council will remind its Financial Assessment and Adult Social Care Teams of the process and eligibility criteria for disability related expenditure to ensure correct and proper decisions are made from the outset when it receives requests or concerns about care charge contributions.The Council will remind its Adult Social Care staff to respond to requests and reviews for disability related expenditure in a timely manner, and to keep service users, or their representative, informed if there are delays in reviewing its decisions.

  • West Northamptonshire Council (22 000 307)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 16-Nov-2022

    Summary

    Mrs X complained the Council made an erroneous decision about deprivation of assets when she transferred hers, and her husband’s property, to her son. Mrs X says this has caused her husband to incur higher care costs. We found the Council had not considered the full factors in its deprivation of assets decision. We also found fault with the delays in the Council considering the full relevant factors and the distress and inconvenience this caused. The Council agreed to our recommendation to complete a review of its decision, apologise to Mrs X and apply a credit of £500 to her husband’s care charges to address this fault.

    Service improvements

    Provide training to its staff about the importance of considering motivation and the full factors and evidence surrounding motivation, when making a decision about deprivation of assets and detailing the Council's thinking about this consideration.

  • West Northamptonshire Council (21 016 519)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 08-Dec-2022

    Summary

    Mrs X complains about the Council’s financial assessment leading to her son, Mr Y, being charged the maximum contribution for his care costs. The Council has accepted it was at fault in the way it completed Mr Y’s financial assessment and has already taken steps to rectify this. The Council has now also agreed to apologise and make a payment to Mrs X as it took too long to respond to her complaint. The Council will also complete the further training for staff on Disability-Related Expenditure and issue a reminder on the importance of responding to complaints within published timescales.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to ensure the expert training to all DRE approvers has been completed.The Council has agreed to issue a reminder to all relevant staff about the importance of responding to complaints within the 20 working day timescale or providing updates to complainants where are response is going to take longer.

  • West Northamptonshire Council (21 014 130)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 29-Jun-2022

    Summary

    Mrs X complained the Council gave incorrect advice and incorrectly assessed her father’s contribution towards care charges, causing distress and financial loss. We found the Council gave incorrect advice but we found no fault in its decision making on care charges. We recommended the Council pay Mrs X £300 for distress and act to prevent recurrence.

    Service improvements

    The Council will remind staff in its Adult Social Care Team that they should not give financial advice, as happened in this case concerning the management of assets in respect of care charging.

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