Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 71 complaints. Of these, 24 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 31 complaints. We investigated 16 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 16 complaints and upheld 14.
88% of complaints we investigated were upheld.
This compares to an average of 84% in similar authorities.
View upheld decisionsAdjusted for Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames's population, this is 8.2% upheld decisions per 100,000 residents.
The average for authorities of this type is
9.1% upheld decisions per 100,000 residents. -
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
In 2 out of 14 upheld cases we found the Council had provided a satisfactory remedy before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.
14% satisfactory remedy rate.
This compares to an average of 12% in similar authorities.
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Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
We recorded compliance outcomes in 13 cases.
In 13 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 Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames
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.
Kingston council slept on resident’s fly-tipping concerns, Ombudsman reports
A dumped mattress caused so much dismay for one Kingston resident that he took his complaint all the way to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.
Couple denied chance of normal family life because of council delays
A couple were denied the chance of a stable family life because Royal Borough of Kingston took two years to give them their own personal care budget, a Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) investigation has found.
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: 24 014 947
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council will remind relevant staff of the importance of carrying out a review or appeal where a service user makes a complaint in which they are clearly unhappy with a decision that carries a right of review or appeal.
Case reference: 24 013 165
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Other
- In reply to my initially enquiries the Council noted some errors in the information it provides about the internal challenge process and the information on its webpage. Council will ensure all letters from the contractor explain people can complain to the council if unhappy with final reply from contractor. Council will also improve info on its website.I also asked the council to ensure it explains that people cannot appeal to court but can raise a defence.
Case reference: 24 001 898
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council will remind officers dealing with homeless applicants of: a)the need to provide a full picture at homeless interviews, particularly when an applicant has children, rather than only outlining the negatives so a homeless applicant can make an informed decision about how to proceed and to prevent any suggestion of gatekeeping;b)the need to record contemporaneous notes from its phone conversations with housing applicants to ensure reliability;c)the need to carry out a suitability assessment to identify the household's needs before making a placement in B&B or other temporary accommodation;d)the need to, where a B&B placement is the only available option, notify applicants who have children, or where a member of the household is pregnant, about the six-week maximum limit and their right to request a suitability review when the main housing duty has been accepted;
- The Council will make its housing officers aware of the Ombudsman’s guide for practitioners on domestic abuse and housing decisions, published in October 2024.
- The Council will review its procurement policy to reduce the use of B&B and increase the supply of other types of temporary accommodation.
- The Council will set up a process to actively monitor cases where families are in B&B to ensure it finds alternative accommodation before the six-week limit is reached.
Case reference: 23 017 702
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- Review its procedures for considering housing register applications to ensure officers consider all the information provided by an applicant in support of their housing register application, send written decisions and ensure officers refer any homelessness application made at the same time to the homelessness team for consideration.
Case reference: 23 013 762
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council will provide the Ombudsman with evidence to show it has carried out compulsory refresher training on how to handle domestic abuse cases and reviewed and amended its procedures for assessing the suitability of accommodation.
Case reference: 23 012 818
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council has agreed to review its commissioning arrangements to ensure these can meet the timescales for needs assessments and provision of SALT and OT, once an EHC Plan is finalised.
Case reference: 23 008 027
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- Take steps to consider what it can do to identify and increase its supply of temporary accommodation which is suitable for families. The Council should report back to the Ombudsman outlining what it will do to address this shortage.
Case reference: 22 013 618
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- By training or other means, remind officers that they must consider all aspects of an applicant’s housing situation and the provisions of chapter 21 of the Homelessness Code of Guidance when considering if a person may be homeless.
Case reference: 22 005 177
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Residential care
- The Council will invite the Care Provider to undertake a review, at a senior level, within three months. The review will focus on why the Care Provider did not notify the Council or Mrs Q of the large number of incidents over a 12-month period which meant falling short of the Fundamental Standards. The purpose of the review is to identify and implement measures which can prevent an injustice to other service users, as well as demonstrating compliance with the Fundamental Standards.
Case reference: 22 010 385
Category: Benefits and tax
Sub Category: COVID-19
- The Council will take action to ensure it signposts to the Ombudsman within its final complaint responses.
- The Council will remind officers who are responsible for Council policy that the Ombudsman expects councils to offer a review or appeal on its decisions.
Last updated: 4 April 2015