Hertfordshire County Council
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 169 complaints. Of these, 43 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 57 complaints. We investigated 69 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 69 complaints and upheld 65.
94% of complaints we investigated were upheld.
This compares to an average of 89% in similar authorities.
View upheld decisionsAdjusted for Hertfordshire County Council's population, this is 5.3 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents.
The average for authorities of this type is
5.3 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents. -
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
In 4 out of 65 upheld cases we found the Council had provided a satisfactory remedy before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.
6% satisfactory remedy rate.
This compares to an average of 10% in similar authorities.
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Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
We recorded compliance outcomes in 54 cases.
In 53 cases we were satisfied with the actions taken.98% 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 Hertfordshire County 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.
Council staff should speak out about discrimination, Ombudsman finds
Hertfordshire County Council has not yet agreed to Ombudsman recommendations to improve its practices after a primary school admitted it had discriminated against a little boy because of his disabilities.
Herts teen left without proper SEND support for three years
A teenager on the autism spectrum was left without a significant proportion of his agreed special educational needs support for up to three years by Hertfordshire County Council, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has found.
Council fails to help care users maintain their homes
Hertfordshire County Council has been asked to review its social care practices to ensure it meets its Care Act duties to help people keep their home tidy.
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: 25 004 337
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council has agreed to provide an updated report on its progress in improving annual review decision-making and issuing amended Plans within statutory timescales. This update should include: current performance data on issuing amendment notices and final amended EHC Plans within the 12-week timescale;actions taken since its previous update to the Ombudsman in May 2025; andprogress against the Council’s stated target to meet statutory decision-making timescales for at least 80% of annual reviews by April 2026.
Case reference: 24 021 641
Category: Children's care services
Sub Category: Child protection
- The Council will review its ‘Managing Allegations Against Adults who work with Children and Young People’ to ensure it allows for clearly defined roles, responsibilities and timescales to be set to keep a person, who is subject to a LADO investigation updated. This is to include how it will monitor any actions after a decision to ensure they are completed within the timeframes set out in its own policies and procedures.
Case reference: 24 013 889
Category: Education
Sub Category: School transport
- The Council will revise it post-16 transport policy to reflect paragraph 37 of the statutory guidance ‘Post 16 transport and travel support to education and training’ January 2019, which says it is good practice not to charge a contribution for transport for a young person assessed under the sixth form age duty if it is likely they will be eligible for free transport under the adult transport duty. The Council will provide training/guidance to those staff responsible for deciding post-16 transport applications, highlighting this change to its policy.
- The Council will provide a memo to staff responsible for deciding post-16 transport support applications reminding them to give clear evidence based decisions on applications which demonstrate the young person’s individual circumstances have been considered.
Case reference: 24 011 585
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council will remind staff that before it decides that a child is not out of education because of poor health, it should seek information about the child's medical needs.
Case reference: 24 010 715
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council will provide the Ombudsman with evidence it has addressed the following matters with staff:the importance of ensuring provision and personal budgets are both arranged and processed in a timely manner, adhering to its customer service standards; andthe importance of effectively communicating with parents.
Case reference: 24 007 910
Category: Education
Sub Category: Alternative provision
- Issue a reminder to all relevant staff regarding the duty to provide education when children are unable to attend school due to illness
Case reference: 24 007 412
Category: Education
Sub Category: Other
- The Council will remind relevant staff dealing with reports of domestic abuse of the need to check whether an alleged perpetrator lives at the same address as the domestic abuse victim or whether there are other circumstances that indicate a letter should not be sent to the victim's home address.
Case reference: 24 007 073
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council will remind relevant staff about the importance of responding to communication in a timely manner; and remind relevant staff of its duty to quickly investigate and act on complaints or concerns raised that the provision is not in place at any time.
Case reference: 24 006 445
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- • Share this decision with the relevant staff and advise the SEND QA Board• Issue a bulletin to relevant staff, reminding them of the process of saving records and the importance of doing so, across the service.
Case reference: 24 004 447
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- 2. Within three months of the final decision the Council will:a) provide an update about the steps taken in reminding staff and having a plan about the need for annual EHC plan reviews and the process staff need to take following a review;
- 2. Within three months of the final decision the Council will:b) provide evidence of the monitoring plan for EHC plan reviews the Council has put into place and its implementation.
Last updated: 4 April 2015