Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the complainant’s business rates liability. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains about the Council seeking to recover business rates backdated to late-2019, and refusing to waive any liability to reflect the COVID-19 grants they had missed out on applying for.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We can 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. So, we do not start 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))
3. In that regard, our role is not to ask whether an organisation could have done things better, or whether we agree or disagree with what it did. Instead, we look at whether there was fault in how it made its decisions. If we decide there was no fault in how it did so, we cannot ask whether it should have made a particular decision or say it should have reached a different outcome.

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by Mrs X, which included the complaint correspondence with the Council, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. I sympathise with Mrs X’s situation, as she appears to have believed the business rates were being paid as part of the management charge she paid to her landlord, and feels she unfairly missed the opportunity to apply for grants available during the COVID-19 pandemic.
6. But I consider there is not enough evidence to suggest this situation has arisen because of any fault in the way the Council handled the business rates account. Rather, it acted in accordance with the information available to it at the relevant times. The Ombudsman will therefore not start an investigation.

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Final decision

7. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman