Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to backdate adoption allowance for the complainant’s adopted daughter. This is because there is no evidence that the decision is flawed.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I will refer to as Mr X, complains that the Council is at fault in declining his request for adoption allowance to be backdated.

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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, or we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (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 the complainant.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X has been awarded adoption allowance from November 2023 for the care of his adopted daughter. He says he first asked for the allowance in November 2021 and that his requests for support have been ignored. He wants the Council to backdate the allowance to November 2021.
6. The Council has considered Mr X’s request and declined to backdate the allowance. It acknowledges that he raised the matter in January 2022, but says no formal assessment was carried out. It says it does not have sufficient information on which to decide to backdate the allowance, and it will not do so.
7. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint. It is not for us to take a view on whether he should be granted adoption allowance for the period. That is a decision for the Council to make. Mr X disagrees with the Council’s decision not to backdate, but that does not mean it amounts to fault. The Council has properly set out why it has refused the request and there is no evidence of fault in the way it made that decision. That being the case, the Ombudsman cannot criticise it, or intervene to substitute an alternative view.
8. Mr X has also said he wants the allowance to continue until his daughter is 21. That is not something an Ombudsman’s investigation could achieve.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is no evidence that the Council’s decision is flawed.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman