Coventry City Council
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 101 complaints. Of these, 26 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 53 complaints. We investigated 22 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
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Complaints upheld
We investigated 22 complaints and upheld 17.
77% of complaints we investigated were upheld.
This compares to an average of 81% in similar authorities.
View upheld decisionsAdjusted for Coventry City Council's population, this is 4.7 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents.
The average for authorities of this type is
4.7 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents. -
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
In 2 out of 17 upheld cases we found the Council had provided a satisfactory remedy before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.
12% satisfactory remedy rate.
This compares to an average of 13% in similar authorities.
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Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
We recorded compliance outcomes in 14 cases.
In 14 cases we were satisfied with the actions taken.100% compliance rate with recommendations.
This compares to an average of 100% in similar authorities.
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 Coventry 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.
City council didn’t do enough to help abused resident
Coventry City Council did not consider what else it could do to help a man who was subject to homophobic abuse when he called on officers to help, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has found.
City council to amend school transport policy following Ombudsman investigation
Coventry City Council has agreed to amend the way it handles appeals about free school transport after the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found its policy did not meet statutory guidelines.
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: 25 003 417
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Refuse and recycling
- The Council has agreed to consider what changes are necessary to ensure it keeps a complete and accurate record of all missed collections and recording how it responds to them.
Case reference: 24 023 359
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Refuse and recycling
- The Council should produce an action plan to identify ways of:a) improving its assisted bin collection service for Ms Y; andb) ensuring all assisted collections on its crews’ routes are properly completed on each collection day.
Case reference: 24 021 380
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Private housing
- training or guidance for officers on progressing cases and when to close an investigation.
Case reference: 24 013 493
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Other
- The Council failed to record its reasons for reducing a person's care provision, delayed reviewing the care plan and communicated poorly and unclearly with the person's relative regarding the cost of the care.In recognition of the Council's delayed care plan review in this case, it has agreed to consider what caused this delay and take action to prevent recurrence of this fault in future.
- In recognition of the Council's failure to explain its reasons properly for reducing the person's care package, the Council has agreed to remind officers that where the Council decides to change or reduce a person’s social care provision, it must record its reasons and considerations for doing this as part of its care plan reviews.
- In recognition of the Council's failure to properly communicate with the person's relative regarding the person's care charges, the Council has agreed to remind officers that where the Council makes changes to a person’s care contribution, it must demonstrate its reasons for this through an updated financial assessment and notify the person ahead of the changes being made.
Case reference: 24 010 723
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council agreed to write to relevant staff to remind them of the low threshold that applies in deciding whether there is reason to believe a homelessness applicant may be in priority need for housing.
Case reference: 24 008 640
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- Within 3 months the Council will remind relevant officers to make contemporaneous notes especially when relating to telephone calls or meetings with applicants, and ask relevant officers to be clear as to what evidence is needed from people using its service. It will also make the decision letters clearer when referring to interim or temporary accommodation.
Case reference: 24 006 936
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council should remind officers of the importance of notifying homelessness applicants of the correct homelessness duty and ensuring the Council accepts and ends the correct duties at relevant times.
Case reference: 24 009 126
Category: Children's care services
Sub Category: Disabled children
- The Council failed to properly explain its appeal decision in response to a request for a Blue Badge. The Council will demonstrate to the Ombudsman that it has taken action, including making changes to its appeal decision letter templates if needed, to ensure that officers deciding on Blue Badge applications and appeals clearly explain how evidence has been considered, the reasons for their decisions, and how their decisions have been made in line with the guidance.
Case reference: 24 004 090
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Other
- The Council agreed to remind staff in its Adult Social Care service about the importance of taking proactive steps to consider suitable support at the earliest opportunity in cases where there are reports of domestic violence, to try to prevent the situation escalating.
Case reference: 23 018 059
Category: Education
Sub Category: Alternative provision
- The Council will identify what steps it needs to take to ensure it has access to information relating to its actions and decision-making around a child's education when a member of staff leaves their role.
Last updated: 4 April 2015