Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the date the Council used for when his mother Mrs Y’s permanent care began. There is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the date the Council used as the start of his mother, Mrs Y’s permanent stay in a care home for the purpose of assessing what she should pay towards her care. He said this means his mother is paying the full cost of her care from an earlier point than she should have done.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

What happened

5. Mrs Y was discharged from hospital to care home A in July 2022. At that stage, the placement was considered a “short stay”. In December 2022, the Council said it would assess her long term care needs. By January 2024, it had decided she needed to stay permanently in a care home and was considering whether there were cheaper care homes that would meet her needs.
6. On 14 March 2023, the Council’s panel decided Mrs Y needed permanent care in a care home. It deferred a decision about which care home, pending further enquiries by a social worker. On 21 March 2023, the Council decided Mrs Y should stay at care home A permanently.
7. On 5 May 2023, the Council wrote to Mr X to confirm Mrs Y’s stay was permanent from 14 March 2023. Later in May, Mr X says care home A told him a new permanent contract had been agreed and would be effective from 6 June 2023. Mr X says this is the date that should be used as the start of her permanent care home stay when assessing what she needs to pay towards her care fees.

My assessment

8. The date the permanent residential care started was the date the Council decided that was what Mrs Y needed, which was 14 March 2023. The fact it did not decide until a week later than the permanent care would be at care home A does not affect the start date for the permanent residential care. It is usual for the actual contracts to follow the decision.
9. We will not consider this complaint further because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council to justify our involvement.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman