The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the quality of a vehicle crossover installed by the Council. The complaint is late and there are no good reasons for us to exercise discretion to consider it now.
The complaint
Mr X complains the Council installed a vehicle crossover at his home which is not of satisfactory quality.
Mr X also complains the Council refused to consider his complaint.
Mr X says the matter has caused him frustration.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended) We will not usually investigate complaint handling if we are not investigating the rest of the complaint. This is because there is not usually enough injustice to justify us doing so. We collect information about particularly poor complaint handling practice and report this back to organisations. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), section 34B(8))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mr X complained the vehicle crossover installed by the Council has defects. The Council installed it in March 2025.
Mr X complained to the Ombudsman in August 2026 after the Council refused to consider his complaint.
As outlined in paragraph five, we cannot investigate late complaints without good reasons. A late complaint is where a person has known about the matter for more than 12 months.
The available evidence suggests Mr X has known about this matter for more than 12 months. I have seen no good reasons why he could not have complained to us sooner.
As there are no good reasons for us to do so, we will not exercise discretion to consider this complaint now and will not investigate.
As we will not investigate the substantive matters of the complaint, we will not investigate the Council’s handling of the complaint because it is not proportionate to do so.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because it is late and there are no good reasons for us to exercise discretion to consider it now.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman