Ombudsman finds Havering council's failure

 to meet woman's care needs left her covering the shortfall with her own savings

By Charlotte Carter on January 17, 2020

A council breached the Care Act by setting an arbitrary upper limit for a woman’s live-in care that failed to cover the costs of meeting her needs, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has found.

The ombudsman found that Havering council in East London allocated Mrs Y, who has advanced dementia, its standard rate for live-in care in November 2018 in the knowledge that none of the agencies on its provider list met this rate. This meant she had to cover the shortfall using her own savings. This was in breach of the requirement under the Care Act for a personal budget to be sufficient to meet the needs a council is required to meet.


A council breached the Care Act by setting an arbitrary upper limit for a woman’s live-in care that failed to cover the costs of meeting her needs, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has found. 
The ombudsman found that Havering council allocated Mrs Y, who has advanced dementia, its standard rate for live-in care in November 2018 in the knowledge that none of the agencies on its provider list met this rate. This meant she had to cover the shortfall using her own savings. This was in breach of the requirement under the Care Act for a personal budget to be sufficient to meet the needs a council is required to meet. 
The failing was one of a number of faults by the council uncovered in the investigation including: 

• failing to meet Mrs Y’s eligible needs for home and day care following an assessment in September 2018, which resulted in her having to meet the costs herself and her daughter, Ms X, having to contact the council to say her mother’s condition had deteriorated; 
• failing to arrange overnight care for Mrs Y after a reassessment in October 2018 concluded she needed this, which led Ms X to set this up herself; 
• waiting six weeks to carry out an urgent assessment of her capacity to make decisions about her accommodation and care, during which she was left at risk;  
• not backdating payments for care Mrs Y should have received to the correct date; 
• causing Ms X “unnecessary stress and frustration” by requiring her to chase the authority numerous times for responses to communication, copies of documents, financial assessments and to start a direct payment application. 

Full reimbursement

Havering has agreed to the ombudsman’s proposed remedies: to establish how much Mrs Y has paid to cover the shortfall in her care and reimburse her in full; reassess her personal budget, taking account of the cost of available care and providing Ms X with a written apology and £250 for the failings and the trouble she had been put to. It also accepted his recommendation to consider whether other service users have been affected by arbitrary upper limits on care rates and take any necessary action to address this, and amend procedures to ensure it doesn’t set arbitrary limits on any care provision.  
Until July 2018, Mrs Y had privately funded her home care. Then her funds fell below the threshold for help with care fees, leading Ms X, who manages her mother’s paperwork and finances, to contact the council requesting an assessment.

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