Mr A complained that Ceredigion County Council (“the Council”) failed to provide a response to his complaint about how it handled his planning application. The Council said it was unable to investigate Mr A’s complaint because it was about the decision to refuse his planning application and therefore it remained open to him to appeal.
The Ombudsman decided that the Council had overlooked aspects of Mr A’s complaint. It had wrongly determined that Mr A’s entire complaint fell outside the statutory complaints procedure. She decided to settle the complaint without an investigation.
The Ombudsman sought and gained the Council’s agreement to identify the aspects of Mr A’s complaint that can be considered under the statutory complaints process, offer Mr A an apology for the delay and agree to provide a Stage 2 complaint response, within 5 working days.