OMBUDSMAN COMPLAINTS
It is possible to complain to the Commissioner for Local Administration (the Ombudsman) about the way a council has administered its affairs if this has caused injustice to an individual or organisation. You cannot use the Ombudsman process to challenge an actual decision on someone’s entitlement to housing benefit. So you could not ask the Ombudsman to investigate whether there was a recoverable overpayment.
Examples of situations in which you might want to complain to the Ombudsman are:
- Delays in payment.
- Claims regularly lost.
- Failure to send out review claim forms.
- Failure to make payments in a way that takes account of the payee's
needs.
- Wrong procedures followed in collecting overpayments.
- General chaotic administration.
- Payments made to the landlord when promised to the claimant and
visa versa.
Before you complain to the Ombudsman you must have put your complaint to the council in writing at least once. Except in Scotland there is no need to go right through a councils complaints procedure before complaining to the Ombudsman. Individuals or organisations can complain, with the exception that in Wales housing associations registered with the Welsh Assembly cannot use the system.
It is now possible to complain direct to the Ombudsman without going through a councillor. You can get a form from most advice centres and send it in. Alternatively you can write direct to the Local Government Ombudsman covering your area. For England you can complain on line at www.lgo.org.uk This site will also give you the postal address for your local office. For Scotland go to www.scottishombudsman.org.uk For Wales go to : www.ombudsman-wales.org ( English Language) or www.ombwdsman-cymru.org (Welsh Language)
The complainant should have available as much information about how the case has been administered as possible. If the organisation is to complain then either one complaint for each claim can be sent in, or a representative sample of perhaps 50 cases could be used.
The Ombudsman’s staff will then investigate. They will inspect the records of both the complainant and the council and will take statements. If they find maladministration which has caused injustice they will issue a report saying what the Ombudsman believes should be done to correct it. While the Ombudsman has no power to enforce the decision, if the council does not implement the recommendation another report can be issued.
The use of the Ombudsman can be an important tool in improving the administration of housing benefit. Given the widespread maladministration it is surprising that there are not far more complaints.
Complaining to the Ombudsman has a number of advantages. It is free. The Ombudsman will often recommend changes in procedure which will improve the administration in future claims. The Ombudsman will often recommend the payment of compensation.
There are also disadvantages. The process is long, sometimes taking up to a year (although if you send a copy of your complaint to the housing benefit section the problem that was the cause of the complaint is likely to get sorted out straight away). The Ombudsman’s report is not legally enforceable (although in practice nearly all councils will accept the recommendations made in it).
You can obtain copies of reports made by the Ombudsman by writing to the London address above. A small charge is made. You can also arrange to have all the reports on housing benefit sent to you for a fixed annual fee.
Typical Reports
Below you will find summaries of some recent reports which will give you an idea of what the Ombudsman can do. The margin notes are the casepaper reference numbers which you will need to quote if you want to order a copy.
There are a large number of complaints which concern council tenants. Almost all the significant ones involve cases where eviction proceedings have been started or a transfer or a similar privilege has been denied because of rent arrears caused by a housing benefit claim or appeal having not yet been processed.
Below are a number of reports relating to other tenants and landlords which are intended to give you an idea of the sort of things it is worth complaining about.
London Borough of Waltham Forest
91/A/4147 A housing association complained of hardship to their vulnerable tenants, waste of staff time and financial losses, resulting from lost forms and correspondence, delays in processing claims, difficulty in getting information out of the council and failure to deal with queries about overpayment requests. The Ombudsman recommended that the council pay the association £1,500 in compensation for delays and £250 for time and trouble in bringing the complaint. Bimonthly liaison meetings between the council and the association should be set up and the council should engage a consultant to help them improve their administration.
North Devon District Council
93/B/2197 The Ombudsman found maladministration because the council, amongst other things, failed to give the claimant a chance to challenge the overpayment before recovering it.
London Borough of Newham
93/A/2118 The council demanded the refund of overpayments from a landlord without advising him of his appeal rights. This was held to be maladministration. The council also withheld benefit payable to other tenants of the landlord for short periods in order to encourage repayment. This was also maladministration. Compensation of £1250 recommended.
Birmingham City Council
89/B/0818 The Birmingham Unemployed Workers Centre, together with some of the council’s neighbourhood offices, encouraged 360 private tenants to complain about delays in payment of between 5 weeks and 3 years. The Ombudsman found that the housing benefit office did not have a satisfactory means of controlling delays. The report found that, where payment was not made within 28 days there was maladministration. The housing benefit office agreed to pay compensation of between £75 and £150 to each claimant who had suffered maladminstration and £500 to the Centre.
Norwich City Council
91/B/2636 The housing benefit office had agreed to pay housing benefit to the landlord but instead paid it to the tenant. The tenant then left and the landlord was unable to collect the money. The Ombudsman recommended that the housing benefit office make a payment to the landlord equivalent to the housing benefit lost and an additional £250 for time and trouble.
Blackburn Borough Council
94/C/3186 This report is interesting for two reasons. Firstly the Ombudsman concluded that there had been maladministration because the council had not made an interim payment within 14 days. The council wanted further information but had not specifically asked for it. The Ombudsman found this unacceptable. Secondly the Ombudsman looked at the rules on payment to the landlord. The claimant had originally requested payment to be made to the landlord. Before payment was made this request was withdrawn. When the landlord asked for a review of the decision to pay the claimant, he was told that he had no right to do so. After taking advice from the Department of Social Security the Ombudsman ruled that the council were wrong, because, once a request for payment to the landlord was made, the landlord became a person affected by any decision on who was to be paid benefit.
Hartlepool Borough Council
96/C/0196 The council delayed holding a review board for 6 months.
LB Ealing
96/A/3916 The claimant requested a further review after having had an initial review request turned down. The review request did not specifically say that a review board was requested and did not give reasons. The council then held another internal review and amended the decision, although still not to the claimant’s satisfaction. The council then told him that he could not have a review board hearing and that he had to go back to the first stage of review, because they had amended the decision. It was held to be maladministration not to hold a review board. A claimant cannot be asked to go back to the beginning again in this sort of situation. The ombudsman also said that, if the council thought the review board request was defective they should have contacted the claimant saying what was wrong with it, to give the claimant a chance to correct the defect.
Plymouth City Council
96/B/3505 Although a council is entitled to suspend benefit when a question arises about whether a person is entitled they must do this as speedily as possible. Unreasonable delays will be maladministration.
Manchester City Council
98/C/1008 The Ombudsman accepted a complaint from the landlord about delays in processing a claim even though it is legally the claim of the tenant.
Nottingham City Council
98/C/2366 The Ombudsman points out that councils must notify all "persons affected" when they suspend benefit because this is a determination. The council cannot lapse a claim if it asks the Benefits Agency for information but the agency does not supply it, unless it has also asked the claimant to get the information.