Service improvements

Surrey 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 21 - 23 of 23 cases with service improvements

Export results (CSV)

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

  • Surrey County Council (21 007 033)

    Category: Education Date: 19-Apr-2022

    Summary

    Mrs X complained about the Council’s handling of her son, F’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan in 2020 and about a failure to provide Occupational Therapy (OT) in line with the Plan. The Council was at fault. It did not issue F’s final EHC Plan in line with statutory timescales and then failed to ensure the OT provision specified in the Plan was in place for the 2020/21 academic year. It also failed to deal with Mrs X’s complaint in a timely manner. The Council agreed to pay Mrs X £500 to recognise the loss of opportunity caused to F and an additional £300 to recognise the distress, uncertainty and time and trouble caused to her.

    Service improvements

    The Council agreed to identify learning points to take forward to prevent delays in complaint handling where a parent has ongoing Special Educational Needs and Disability tribunal appeals which are unrelated to the matters subject to the complaint.

  • Surrey County Council (21 005 214)

    Category: Education Date: 30-May-2022

    Summary

    Mrs R complains the Council wrongly ended her daughter’s (Child B) personal budget which was used to support her special educational needs. She also complains the Council has delayed in amending Child B’s Education and Health Care Plan (EHCP). We have identified numerous and serious failings by the Council which amount to poor administrative practice in some areas. The Council repeatedly made flawed decisions about Child B’s personal budget based on no clear rationale or criteria. It also failed to provide Mrs R her legal right to challenge the decisions through a clear review process. The Council also failed to adhere to statutory guidance relating to the timeframe for amending an EHCP. Mrs R has suffered serious loss, harm and distress by reason of the Council’s failings. The Council has agreed to our recommendations to remedy the serious injustice identified.

    Service improvements

    The Council will establish a clear policy relating to personalbudgets and direct payments. This will include clear and simple statements ofeligibility criteria and the decision-making processes. The policy will bepublished as part of the Council's Local Offer and made accessible to the public inaccordance with statutory guidance.The Council will provide formal training to all officers who are (i)responsible for making personal budget decisions and; (ii) responsible forrecording written decisions relating to personal budgets. The training willfocus on the new policy established and how decisions are to be properlymade and recorded to demonstrate good administrative practice in the future.At a senior level, the Council will review its systems and practiceswith respect to conducting reviews of personal budget decisions. Specifically,the Council will produce a template document informing parents of a personalbudget outcome. This will contain information relating to a right of review.Further, the Council will develop a robust review process. This will includethe timetable for completing a review and how the decision will be reviewed.The Council will implement a practice of sending parents an outcome letter ofthe review exercise which fully explains how the decision was reached. TheCouncil will adopt further measures it considers appropriate following a fullreview.

  • Surrey County Council (21 001 931)

    Category: Education Date: 02-May-2022

    Summary

    Mr A complains on behalf of Mrs X, his daughter, that the Council has not dealt properly with education provision or Special Educational Needs (SEN) provision for his granddaughter Y. The Council is at fault because it delayed issuing a decision about Y’s Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP), it delayed Mrs X’s appeal rights, used disrespectful language, did not provide a Child In Need (CIN) plan in time and did not postpone a meeting. The Council has made some service improvements. In addition, the Council should apologise, Pay Mrs X £3,000 for missed education provision, Pay Mrs X £500 for distress/outrage, pay Mr A £50 for time and trouble and provide guidance to staff.

    Service improvements

    Provide guidance to staff to ensure that EHCP processes are managed to ensure, as far as practicable, that mediation and appeal rights are not compromised. Where it is foreseeable that this may occur, it should ensure letters about mediation and appeal rights include a warning about this to enable recipients to make informed decisions about how to proceed; andProvide guidance to staff to ensure that the Council follows its complaints policy in relation to acknowledging complaints and providing information about delays

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