Service improvements

London Borough of Croydon

Showing service improvements between 1 April 2025 and 31 March 2026

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 - 10 of 18 cases with service improvements

Export results (CSV)

Downloads the current filtered list of service improvement decisions for London Borough of Croydon as a CSV file.

  • London Borough of Croydon (25 009 045)

    Category: Education Date: 23-Mar-2026

    Summary

    The Council was at fault for failing to ensure Ms X’s child Y received the Speech and Language Therapy (SALT) in their Education, Health and Care Plan between January 2025 and February 2026 and Occupational Therapy between January 2025 and November 2025. Poor communication from the Council during that time added to Ms X’s frustration. The Council has agreed to ensure SALT provision is secured for Y, apologise to Ms X and make a payment to acknowledge her frustration and the impact on Y of the missed provision. It will also provide an update on its commissioning arrangements to ensure these can meet requirements for SALT and OT provision.

    Service improvements

    The Council will provide an update to the Ombudsman on its intention to directly employ Occupational Therapists and the impact this has had on securing Occupational Therapy provision.The Council will review how Speech and Language Therapy is commissioned and arranged when it is required as part of a final Education, Health and Care plan.

  • London Borough of Croydon (25 005 953)

    Category: Education Date: 04-Mar-2026

    Summary

    The Council’s different departments failed to work collaboratively to plan for Ms Y’s transition to adult care services from an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan. The Council failed to consider an interim review of Ms Y’s EHC Plan and to ensure it met her eligible care needs. It also failed to properly respond to Ms Y’s parents’ (Mr and Mrs X) complaint. This caused Ms Y distress and uncertainty and Mr and Mrs X time and trouble pursuing the matter. The Council has agreed to apologise, make a payment to Ms Y and Mr and Mrs X, and carry out a review that considers both Ms Y’s education and social care needs.

    Service improvements

    The Council’s different departments failed to work collaboratively to plan for a young adult's transition to adult care services from an Education, Health and Care Plan. The Council has agreed to review its approach to planning transitions to adult care services for young people with an Education, Health and Care Plan. The Council should create an action plan identifying how its adult social care and Special Educational Needs teams will work together to ensure transitions are properly planned and implemented as set out in the Special Educational Needs Code of Practice and Care and Support Statutory Guidance.

  • London Borough of Croydon (25 002 070)

    Category: Housing Date: 25-Mar-2026

    Summary

    Mrs D complains about the handling of her homelessness application. I have found some fault by the Council including a failure to include medical needs information in the personalised housing plan. The Council has agreed to apologise to Mrs D and pay redress for avoidable time and trouble caused by delays and errors.

    Service improvements

    consider whether training or guidance is needed for officers about including medical and support information in personalised housing plans

  • London Borough of Croydon (25 001 720)

    Category: Housing Date: 27-Feb-2026

    Summary

    The Council was at fault for a four-month delay in carrying out an assessment after Mr X approached the Council as homeless. It also failed to provide interim accommodation whilst it carried out homeless inquiries and issue a main housing duty decision. The Council has agreed to apologise, pay Mr X £1050 and review its procedures to remedy the injustice caused.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to create an action plan to address how it will reduce its delays in carrying out housing assessments.The Council has agreed to review its procedures to ensure it is communicating effectively with homeless applicants and sending key decision letters when it accepts or rejects a housing duty.The Council has agreed to review its procedures to ensure it is considering whether an applicant requires interim accommodation when it is making homeless inquiries and making a record of this decision.

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 022 233)

    Category: Housing Date: 13-Mar-2026

    Summary

    The Council was at fault for failing to provide interim accommodation or to accept the relevant homelessness duties when Miss X approached it for assistance when she was homeless after fleeing domestic abuse. This meant Miss X was left without accommodation for two months. The Council should apologise to Miss X and make a payment to acknowledge the distress and frustration caused.

    Service improvements

    The Council should provide evidence to the Ombudsman of the changes it says the housing service implemented to ensure vulnerable residents are supported through the online application process.The Council should provide training to housing service staff to ensure they understand the housing duties owed to someone fleeing domestic abuse.

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 021 812)

    Category: Education Date: 02-Dec-2025

    Summary

    Miss X complained the Council delayed issuing an Education, Health and Care Plan to her son following a review. Miss X also complained the Council failed to ensure her son received the required special educational provision while he was attending school and failed to ensure he received appropriate education for the period he did not attend school. Miss X says the Council’s actions caused avoidable distress to her and her son. We found some delay by the Council. The Council has agreed to apologise to Miss X for the fault identified.

    Service improvements

    Ensure the Council has a process in place to monitor responses from schools following reviews of Education, Health and Care Plans, to ensure review reports are provided to the Council within the prescribed timeframe

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 020 730)

    Category: Adult care services Date: 09-Oct-2025

    Summary

    Mr X complained the Council delayed providing his son with respite care when he transitioned from children to adult services. We find the Council was at fault for the delay in securing suitable respite care for Mr X’s son. This caused distress and upset, and Mr X’s son lost out on care he was entitled to. The Council has agreed to apologise to Mr X and his son, make payments to them and implement a service improvement.

    Service improvements

    The Council has agreed to review its procedures for transition planning for young people approaching 18. The review should focus on how staff will ensure assessments take place early enough so there are no gaps in provision, and an adult care package is in place for when the young person turns 18.

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 018 050)

    Category: Education Date: 24-Jun-2025

    Summary

    The Council was at fault as it failed to provide occupational therapy for Miss X’s child from September 2024 to March 2025 in line with their Education, Health and Care Plan, and it poorly communicated and handled her case. It will apologise and make a payment to Miss X to acknowledge the impact of the missed occupational therapy provision. It will also identify why it failed to arrange the occupational therapy provision and report back to us on the action it has taken to address this.

    Service improvements

    The Council will identify the issues that led to the failure to arrange Occupational Therapy provision for a child in line with their Education, Health and Care Plan and report back to us on the steps it will take to avoid similar issues from happening in future.

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 017 787)

    Category: Education Date: 05-Oct-2025

    Summary

    Mrs X complained the Council failed to ensure her child, Y received an education or the specialist provision in line with their Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan after they moved to the area in July 2024. The Council was at fault for failing to offer Y a school placement or arrange an education and provision in line with their EHC Plan between September 2024 and May 2025. The Council agreed to apologise and make payments to acknowledge the injustice this caused to Y and Mrs X. It should also carry out service improvements.

    Service improvements

    The Council will review its processes to consider what changes or action it needs to ensure that where a child with an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan is not attending school that it has systems in place to secure the provision in the Plan as far as possible outside the school setting.The Council will remind relevant staff that where it asks another organisation to arrange and secure provision in an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan that the Council remains liable and therefore it should carry out sufficient oversight of that organisation.

  • London Borough of Croydon (24 014 650)

    Category: Environment and regulation Date: 12-Dec-2025

    Summary

    Mr B complained the Council has repeatedly failed to collect his waste on the scheduled days. He also complained about the Council’s complaint-handling. The Council was at fault for the repeated failure to collect Mr B’s waste on the scheduled days and keep a record of its monitoring of Mr B’s waste collections. It was also at fault for its poor complaint-handling. Because of the fault, Mr B suffered frustration and uncertainty, and it meant he continued to contact the Council to report the missed collections. The Council has agreed to make a symbolic payment, issue staff briefings, and send us evidence of an investigation it says it is carrying out.

    Service improvements

    The Council will issue a staff briefing to remind relevant staff of the importance of record-keeping when monitoring collections. The Council should ensure clear records are kept of any monitoring it carries out, so it can evidence these actions in future if needed. This will help to ensure proper oversight of collections monitoring to prevent similar failings in future.The Council will issue a staff briefing to remind relevant staff of the importance of appropriately escalating and responding to complaints where the issues complained of persist. This will help to ensure service users receive appropriate and timely responses to their complaint.The Council will send us evidence of an investigation it says it is carrying out about the failure to keep records of the monitoring that was carried out in this case, and the outcome of the investigation. This will help to ensure the Council is considering the issues as it says it is, and putting in place actions to prevent similar failings in future.

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