Service improvements

Kent County 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 11 - 20 of 24 cases with service improvements

Export results (CSV)

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

  • Kent County Council (22 005 871)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 14-Nov-2022

    Summary

    Mrs X complains about the Council’s handling of her son’s financial assessment, which she says resulted in a delay in setting up his direct payments and his aunt no longer being willing to take on the role of his personal assistant. The Council accepts it mishandled the financial assessment. It has apologised and agreed to backdate the direct payments. The Council failed to take account of its duties under the Equality Act 2010 by sending him a financial assessment which did not take account of his personal financial circumstances or his need for support with the process. The Council needs to apologise for the avoidable confusion and distress caused. It also needs to take action to ensure it takes proper account of its duties under the Equality Act when doing financial assessments.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to identify the action it is going to take to make sure the financialassessment process takes account of its duties under the Equality Act 2010.

  • Kent County Council (22 003 217)

    Category: Education Date: 25-Nov-2022

    Summary

    Mr X complained about the support the Council provided after his son, Y, was excluded from school. There was fault in how the Council arranged alternative education for Y, failed to consider reviewing Y’s Education, Health and Care plan and delays in arranging a new school place. The Council also communicated poorly with Mr X. This caused Y to not receive a full-time education for several months and significant avoidable distress to Mr X. The Council agreed to apologise, pay Mr X a financial remedy and review its practices.

    Service improvements

    The Council agreed to review how it arranges alternative education for permanently excluded pupils to ensure it arranges a full-time education form the sixth day following exclusion unless it decides this is not in a pupil’s interests. Where this is the case, it should ensure it fully records its decision about this and shares the reasons for its decision with parents.The Council agreed to review its approach to reviewing Education Health and Care plans following the permanent exclusion from schools named in those plans. It should ensure it properly considers whether to review Education Health and Care plans when it becomes aware such a school placement has permanently broken down.

  • Kent County Council (22 002 957)

    Category: Education Date: 09-Jan-2023

    Summary

    Mrs X complained about errors in the Council’s handling of her son, Y’s, Education Health and Care (EHC) Plan between October 2020 and September 2022. She said this caused uncertainty and distress for two years and meant Y has missed out on specialist educational provisions. The Council was at fault. There were delays issuing two EHC Plans between October 2020 and September 2022. It failed to appropriately consider Mrs X’s request for occupational therapy advice as part of an EHC needs assessment process. There was also poor communication. The Council will apologise to Mrs X, make financial payments to remedy the uncertainty and distress caused and Y’s lost provision and improve its services.

    Service improvements

    The Council will remind officers they must consider parental requests for professional advice during Educational Health and Care Plan assessments and seek the advice, if the request is reasonable.The Council will remind officers of the importance of keeping parents updated during the Education, Health and Care needs assessment process.The Council will review its Education, Health and Care plan procedures to ensure: officers complete the required paperwork after annual reviews and it has an effective way to monitor this; it completes needs assessments and re-assessments within the statutory timescales and it has an effective way to monitor this.

  • Kent County Council (22 002 630)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 16-Jan-2023

    Summary

    Mrs X complains the Council’s care provider, Harbledown Lodge: failed to care for her late mother properly, resulting in a decline in her condition; failed to respond properly to concerns about her care; and gave notice rather than address their concerns, causing unnecessary distress. The care provider did not fail to care for Mrs X’s mother. However, it caused unnecessary distress by giving notice in the way that it did. The Council needs to apologise for the distress caused to Mrs X.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to identify the action it is going to take to ensure officers take moreproactive action to avoid people being moved to another care home when stepscould be taken to avoid this.

  • Kent County Council (21 019 100)

    Category: Education Date: 13-Oct-2022

    Summary

    Mr C complained about the Council’s failure to find an education placement for his son D since May 2021. While recognising the efforts the Council has made, we found fault which has caused D and his family significant injustice. The Council has agreed to apologise, pay £3,250 for the educational benefit of D and £300 to Mr C and consider steps to widen the availability of placements for the future.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed within three months of the date of my final decision:to consider any further action it can take to increase the choice and availability of placements for young people in D’s position.

  • Kent County Council (21 017 835)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 14-Dec-2022

    Summary

    The Care Provider acting on behalf of the Council failed to protect Mrs D’s property and properly consider the decision not to allow her in communal areas of the care home. It also failed to follow medical advice in the last week of Mrs D’s life and contact family members when Mrs D was administered end of life medication. As well as the actions already taken to address issues about missing items; the Council has agreed to apologise to the complainants, pay £500 to acknowledge the time, trouble, and uncertainty the Care Provider’s actions have caused. It has also agreed through its contract monitoring to ensure the Care Provider reminds staff about risk assessing, following medical instructions, updating family, recording, and considering human rights when making decisions.

    Service improvements

    Provide evidence from the Care Provider of the reviewed policies for inventories when people move into the care home;Through contract monitoring ensure that staff are reminded and if necessary trained on:- human rights and how the way in which care is provided can infringe on these rights such as the right to family life; recording of decisions, and reviewing care plans; the importance of following and recording advice from other professionals such as the GP; the need to contact family members when there are significant changes in a resident’s care needs or circumstances.

  • Kent County Council (21 017 510)

    Category: Education Date: 25-Jul-2022

    Summary

    Miss B complained that the Council, in respect of her daughter C, failed to provide special educational support in accordance with her EHC plan, failed to carry out Annual Reviews, failed to provide alternative education when she was unable to attend school and failed to communicate properly with Miss B. We have found fault with the Council, which caused significant injustice to Miss B and C. The Council has agreed to apologise, pay £500 to Miss B, £4,000 to C and improve its service for the future.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to undertake a detailed review of its policy and procedure for responding to situations where a child is out of school and not receiving education,identifies the reasons why the Council repeatedly says the responsibility for education in these circumstances is down to the school and suggests improvements which can be made to improve staff understanding and implementation of this key duty.

  • Kent County Council (21 013 375)

    Category: Education Date: 29-May-2022

    Summary

    Mr D complained about the Council’s handling of his three children’s Education, Health and Care plans. The Council agreed it caused delays in reviewing and amending their plans, and it failed to provide some special educational needs provision. This was fault. It will apologise to Mr D and his children, and make payment to acknowledge the distress, time and trouble, and loss of provision they experienced.

    Service improvements

    The Council will provide the Ombudsman with the procedural changes it said it has made internally, and with schools, to ensure it meets the statutory timescales for reviewing EHC plans and issuing amended EHC plans to parents.The Council will review how it keeps parents informed about any delays in the EHC plan process, and how it learns from these to prevent such delays in future.The Council will review its three-month trial with Mr D in which he were to provide his designated Council Officer with details about issues and needs for his children, and agree with Mr D whether to continue to trial.

  • Kent County Council (21 011 094)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 09-Jun-2022

    Summary

    The Council failed to properly assess the impact of reducing Mr X’s care package. This put his health and wellbeing at risk and led to a loss of care provision for almost a year. It also caused him distress, uncertainty and time and trouble. The Council has agreed to pay Mr X £1,600 to acknowledge the avoidable injustice caused by these faults and has committed to making our recommended service improvements.

    Service improvements

    The Council will remind staff of the importance of ensuring that an adult's care needs continue to be met when their care plan is under review, particularly if there is a period of dispute regarding the number of care hours it proposes.The Council will remind staff of its duty to clearly set out in its reviews and assessments how a person’s eligible needs under the Care Act will be met, particularly where it proposes to reduce someone’s care hours.The Council will remind staff that its policy for reviewing care plans allows for the provision of cleaners to help people meet their eligible needs under the Care Act.The Council will remind staff of the importance of considering the individual financial circumstances of an adult needing care when recommending the use of a hot meals service in the place of care hours.

  • Kent County Council (21 009 688)

    Category: Education Date: 23-Jun-2022

    Summary

    The Council was at fault for the delay in finding Mrs X’s son a suitable school placement and provide him with the provision as outlined in his Education, Health and Care Plan. To remedy the injustice caused by the fault, the Council has agreed to make a payment to Mrs X and her son. The Council has also agreed to make a service improvement.

    Service improvements

    The Council has already completed work to amend and simplify the procedure for children with Education, Health and Care plans who move to its area.The Council has agreed to provide evidence to the Ombudsman that the simplified procedure has been communicated to all relevant council officers to ensure they are aware of the Council's responsibilities and the statutory timescales that apply when children with Education, Health and Care plans move into its area.

LGO logogram

Review your privacy settings

Required cookies

These cookies enable the website to function properly. You can only disable these by changing your browser preferences, but this will affect how the website performs.

View required cookies

Analytical cookies

Google Analytics cookies help us improve the performance of the website by understanding how visitors use the site.
We recommend you set these 'ON'.

View analytical cookies

In using Google Analytics, we do not collect or store personal information that could identify you (for example your name or address). We do not allow Google to use or share our analytics data. Google has developed a tool to help you opt out of Google Analytics cookies.

Privacy settings