Cambridge City Council
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 15 complaints. Of these, 6 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 9 complaints. We investigated 0 complaints.
More about this data
Complaints dealt with – the total number of complaints and enquiries considered. It is not appropriate to investigate all of them.
Not for us – includes complaints brought to us before the council was given chance to consider it, or the complainant came to the wrong Ombudsman.
Assessed and closed – includes complaints where the law says we’re not allowed to investigate, or it would be a poor use of public funds if we did.
Investigated – we completed an investigation and made a decision on whether we found fault, or no fault.
Complaints upheld – we completed an investigation and found evidence of fault, or the organisation provided a suitable remedy early on.
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council – the council upheld the complaint and we agreed with how it offered to put things right.
Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations – not complying with our recommendations is rare. A council with a compliance rate below 100% should scrutinise the complaints where it failed to comply and identify any learning.
Average performance rates – we compare the annual statistics of similar types of councils to work out an average level of performance. We do this for County Councils, District Councils, Metropolitan Boroughs, Unitary Councils, and London Boroughs.
For more information on understanding our statistics see Interpreting our complaints data.
Complaints dealt with
Not for us
Assessed and closed
Investigated
-
Complaints upheld
The Ombudsman carried out no investigations in this period
-
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
The Ombudsman did not uphold any complaints in this period
-
Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
No recommendations were due for compliance in this period
Annual letters
We write to councils each year to give a summary of the complaint statistics we record about them,
and their performance in responding to our investigations.
Reports
The Ombudsman has published the following reports against Cambridge City Council
Find out more about reports
We issue reports on certain investigations, particularly where there is a wider public interest to do so. Common reasons for reports are significant injustice, systemic issues, major learning points and non-compliance with our recommendations. Issuing reports is one way we help to ensure councils are accountable to local people and highlighting the learning from complaints helps to improve services for everybody. Reports are published for 10 years.
No reports published
Service improvements
The Council has agreed to make the following improvements to its services following an Ombudsman investigation.
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.
The latest 10 cases are listed below – click ‘view all’ to find all service improvements.
Case reference: 22 006 613
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Licensing
- The Council will change its record keeping procedures to ensure it keeps records of biodiversity assessments and inspections even when it does not identify any substantive issues or risks.
Case reference: 21 018 416
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- The Council will review how it shares information about the local out-of-hospital homelessness scheme’s benefits and expectations with people, and how it accurately records those conversations in its records.
- The Council will provide evidence it has reminded staff to accurately record decisions about the suitability of accommodation, as it had already recognised it was necessary.
Case reference: 21 015 046
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Noise
- The Council has agreed to provide evidence that it has carried out the service improvements it identified in a complaint response. These are:• a review of its noise assessment and decision-making processes;• measures to ensure consistency around officer attendance on visits and signing off on decision-making;• relevant training to be arranged for environmental health officers to ensure processes are followed; and• review and update the Council's website to make it clear what customers can expect from this part of the service.
Case reference: 20 010 732
Category: Other Categories
Sub Category: Land
- The Council will review its ‘Unreasonable and Unreasonably Persistent Complainants’ policy and consider whether it requires updating to ensure consistency with the Ombudsman’s ‘Guidance on managing unreasonable behaviour’.
Last updated: 4 April 2015