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Selected Cases and Summaries of Completed Investigations - April to September 2000
Volume 3 - 3rd REPORT - SESSION 2000-2001
Chapter 1
DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SECURITY
13. Case No. C.423/00
Child Support Agency: poor handling leading to gross inconvenience and worry and distress Summary
In February 1997 the Child Support Agency made a maintenance assessment of £69.08 a week for Mr B with an effective date of 22 January 1997. The effective date was wrongly recorded on the Child Support Agency's computer system as 22 January 1996. Consequently Mr B received computer-generated correspondence overstating the amount of child support maintenance he owed by over £3,600. He challenged the amounts and told the Child Support Agency that he had suicidal feelings. Despite the involvement of the Child Support Agency's welfare section the error was not spotted until August 1999. The Ombudsman found that the Child Support Agency had many opportunities to put matters right, and that they had also acted insensitively in making a deduction from earnings order against Mr B's employers without discussing the matter with him as had been intended. After the Ombudsman's involvement the Child Support Agency paid a total of £500 to Mr B for the gross inconvenience and the worry and stress their actions had caused.
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Full text
1. Mr B complained that the Child support Agency (CSA), an executive agency of the Department of Social Security (DSS), mishandled the information on which his maintenance assessments were based, misinformed him about arrears, and failed to keep him adequately informed.
2. My investigation began in late October 1999 once the Ombudsman had obtained comments on the complaint from the Chief Executive of CSA. I have not put into this report every detail investigated by the Ombudsman's staff, but I am satisfied that no matter of significance has been overlooked. In this report all references to "maintenance" are to child support maintenance.
Background
3. CSA were set up under the Child Support Act 1991 to administer the assessment, collection and enforcement of child support maintenance. The parent with care initiates the process by completing a maintenance application form that provides details about the non-resident parent (formerly known as the absent parent). CSA then send the non-resident parent a maintenance enquiry form to obtain a financial statement so that the amount of maintenance can be assessed under a standard formula. Maintenance assessments were made and reviewed by child support officers based in regional CSA centres. Local field offices can help in gathering information or carrying out interviews.
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4. From 18 April 1995 liability for maintenance started eight weeks from the date on which the maintenance enquiry form was sent or handed to the non-resident parent (subject to certain conditions which were met in Mr B's case). That is known as the effective date. If a non-resident parent fails to make payments, and CSA seek to recover arrears of child support maintenance which have accrued, they must first send him an arrears notice so that he may pay the full amount or negotiate a voluntary agreement to pay the arrears over a period of time. A deduction from earnings order may be imposed against an employer if a non-resident parent fails to make regular payments of child maintenance.
5. During most of the period covered by Mr B's case CSA were obliged to carry out periodical reviews of assessments and either parent could ask for a review if they believed that their own, or the other parent's, circumstances had changed. They could also request a review of any maintenance assessment by a different child support officer (a second-tier review) or, if they remained dissatisfied, appeal to a child support appeal tribunal (the tribunal). In accordance with arrangements introduced on 2 December 1996, once a full maintenance assessment has been made, a non-resident parent may apply for a departure from the standard formula to take account of various special expenses. An officer on behalf of the Secretary of State makes a departure decision, but there is a right of appeal against the decision to a tribunal.
6. Shared care is defined as where more than one person has day-to-day care of a child and they do not live in the same household. The legislation does not provide a definition of day-to-day care. A person is treated as having day-to-day care if he has care of the child for at least 104 nights in a 12-month period. If the care is for less than 104 nights he remains liable for the full child maintenance and his contribution to the care of the child is not taken into account in calculating the amount of child maintenance.
7. Where someone makes a threat of suicide to CSA his or her case is referred to the special welfare section (welfare section) for consideration. Instructions are available to all staff, who might come into contact with the public, which tell them how to proceed when a threat has been made. A nominated officer sends the person making the threat a pro-forma letter, which explains that actions will be suspended, and the case reviewed. On completion of the review the nominated officer completes and signs a report to the effect that the case is accurate and in order. A second letter tells the person the outcome of the enquiry and whether action is to be continued. The instructions make it plain, however, that CSA have a statutory duty to impose and implement maintenance assessments. They also say that CSA staff should not offer counselling since that requires special expertise.
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8. Under the terms of the non-statutory DSS compensation scheme, the scope of which the Ombudsman and his predecessors have accepted, CSA may make consolatory payments, in exceptional circumstances. They may be made where, as a result of official error, a person has suffered gross inconvenience or severe distress. The guidance says that a range of factors defines gross inconvenience and consideration should be given to whether the error was persisted in and the seriousness of its effect. Severe distress is defined as the physical effect experienced directly as a result of an error and it may express itself as a serious deterioration in either physical or mental health.
Jurisdiction
9. It is not for the Ombudsman to determine a person's liability for, or entitlement to, child support maintenance. Nor, in the absence of maladministration, may the Ombudsman criticise discretionary decisions taken by officers acting on behalf of the Secretary of State. The Ombudsman is generally debarred from investigating any action in respect of which a person has, or had, a right of appeal and where that right has been exercised, the bar on the Ombudsman's intervention is absolute. I refer to such matters in this report only to set in context the administrative actions of CSA in dealing with Mr B's case.
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Investigation
10. 1996 The parent with care of Mr B's son (whom I refer to as Ms A) completed a maintenance application form on 26 October 1996 and sent it to the field office. They in turn asked Mr B to complete a maintenance enquiry form on 27 November and on 10 December the field office received the completed form.
11. On 24 January 1997 the field office sent the papers to the regional office for calculation of a maintenance assessment. On 3 February the regional office calculated an assessment of £69.08 a week. In their manual notes the regional office showed the effective date as 22 January 1997, ie eight weeks from the date the maintenance enquiry form was sent to Mr B (paragraph 13.4), but they wrongly entered the date as 22 January 1996 on CSA's computer system. The regional office sent a computer-generated letter notifying both parents of the assessment, and the wrong effective date, on 4 February. Meanwhile the regional office realised that they had made a minor error in their calculations and a supervisor also noted the correct effective date. On 6 February the regional office made a fresh assessment of £70.13 a week effective from 22 January 1997. On 10 February Mr B appealed against the amount of the first maintenance assessment, which was treated by the regional office as a request for review. He gave full particulars of his outgoings and suggested that he had greater care of his son than did Ms A. The regional office decided on 30 April that the assessment made on 6 February had superseded the earlier assessment and that that would be the one reviewed. They decided that Mr B had established grounds for review but that they needed further information from both parents. On 13 May the regional office received a letter from Mr B with a diary record of his care of his son. He said that Ms A would spend any child support maintenance on herself. He also said that taking money from him would mean that he could not afford to live: he would have to give up his house and all he had worked for. He would be left with the options of suicide or giving up everything to live for the rest of his life on benefits, and that there was "nothing between the two". (The regional office did not refer the letter to the welfare section.) The following day the regional office set up the accounts using the wrong effective date for the start of child support maintenance.
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12. On 15 May the regional office notified Mr B that by 30 May he would owe arrears of maintenance amounting £4,904.31. (That was calculated at £69.08 a week between 22 January 1996 and 21 January 1997, and £70.13 a week from 22 January to 30 May 1997.) They asked him to clear the arrears by 30 May and to begin making payments of £70.13 from 6 June. Meanwhile on 2 June the regional office completed a second tier review and decided that there would be no changes to the maintenance assessment. They noted that the dispute concerning shared care was best left for a tribunal to resolve. Mr B wrote to the regional office on 12 June. He pointed out that he had been first contacted in January 1997 and that 20 weeks' maintenance at £70.13 a week amounted to only £1,402.60. He asked how the arrears had been calculated. Mr B again mentioned the options of suicide or giving up everything for a life on benefit and asked "please acknowledge receipt of this letter". On this occasion the regional office notified welfare section of the suicide threat. On 26 June welfare section told Mr B that action would be suspended until 8 July, and that "all aspects" of his case would be checked and he would then be informed of the outcome (paragraph 13.7). On 1 July, in a letter informing the regional office about Ms A's address and activities (and which they received on 11 July) Mr B told CSA that he had given authority for his mother to act, in the event of his suicide. Meanwhile Mr B had appealed against the decision not to alter his maintenance assessment and on 3 July the tribunal requested information from the regional office.
13. On 7 July welfare section decided that the suspension of action would continue until after CSA's appeals unit had completed their consideration. There is no evidence that they informed Mr B of that. On 23 July the regional officer noted that the effective date of the "initial" maintenance assessment was 22 January 1997. On 28 August welfare section learned that Mr B's appeal would not be heard until about mid-October. They noted on a pro-forma report his (second) reference to suicide but also noted as 22 January 1996 the date of the first maintenance assessment. They did not complete the second page of the report which included a printed section headed "the case has been checked for accuracy and is in order". On 1 October the tribunal found that Mr B had not assumed sufficient care of his son in order to qualify under the shared care arrangements (paragraph 13.6). They noted two minor errors in the maintenance assessment calculations which they believed would not affect matters in any practical way. On 16 October the appeals unit re-examined the assessment in the light of the tribunal's decision but decided that it should remain unchanged at £70.13 a week effective from 22 January 1997.
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14. On 21 October the regional office received a letter from Mr B which talked of suicide. He suggested that a "suicide manager" might visit his family. On 22 October the appeals unit received a request for an appeal form, in which Mr B also talked of suicide. On 23 October welfare section completed a report. They noted that Mr B had not paid any child support maintenance and that arrears stood at £6,306.91, based on a liability running from 22 January 1996. They recognised that Mr B appeared very distressed and that negotiations to secure an arrears agreement would need to be handled sensitively. They suggested that a small contribution toward the arrears might be tried initially to allow Mr B time to adjust to paying the regular maintenance due. The welfare section manager agreed with the proposals and considered Mr B's threat (of self-harm) not to be serious. On 29 October the appeals unit learned that Mr B had appealed against the decision of 16 October.
15. 1998 On 27 January 1998 the appeals unit asked the tribunal for a priority listing of Mr B's new appeal in view of his suicide threats. On 23 March the tribunal dismissed Mr B's appeal. The tribunal noted a number of matters arising after the decision under appeal (and therefore outside their jurisdiction), such as the effect of a recent court order and some possible changes in circumstances, as yet unreported. Mr B wrote to the manager at the regional office on 31 March. He said that the arrears should be in the region of £4,200 based on the fact that Ms A's application had run for about 60 weeks. He said that a court had made an order on 26 January 1998 facilitating at least 169 overnight stays a year at his house by his son. (Ms A had advised the regional office in February that their son should stay with Mr B on 5 nights out of 14.) Mr B referred to existing debts and again referred to the two options he had previously outlined - suicide or benefits. He ended "Please reply to this letter as I cannot carry on much longer".
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16. On 30 April the regional office noted that welfare section interest was over and that the suspension of action could be lifted. The regional office decided to impose a deduction from earnings order against Mr B's employer to collect £77.21 a week, made up of £70.13 regular maintenance and £7.08 toward the arrears. They notified Mr B and his employers the following day. On 11 May a Member of Parliament wrote to the regional office manager drawing attention to a reduction in Mr B's earnings, the court order and Ms A's income. On 26 May welfare section again examined Mr B's case and on the following day the manager again considered Mr B's threats not to be serious. Nevertheless she asked for Mr B's change in circumstances to be reviewed urgently and said that, irrespective of the outcome, the total amount specified in a deduction from earnings order should not exceed £65 a week. On 28 May the regional office received the first payment of £334.58 under the deduction from earnings order (the monthly equivalent of £77.21 a week specified on 1 May). On 1 June the regional office notified both parents of a revised maintenance assessment of £42.18 a week, effective from 4 February 1998. (That reflected shared care and not Mr B's reduced earnings.) The regional office calculated that arrears stood at over £8,000. They subsequently varied the deduction from earnings order to collect £57.18 a week made up of regular maintenance of £42.18 and £15 toward arrears.
17. On 11 June the regional office replied to Mr Barnes. They noted the information given and said that enquiries had been made of Mr B's employer about earnings. Also on that day Mr B wrote to the regional office manager and contested various figures used in the assessment calculations. He asked for application forms for second tier review, appeal and departure (paragraph 13.5). He said that the effect of the court order was that he had custody of his son for 46.3% of the time. He ended "If suicide is the only answer then I hope you have the decency to explain to my little boy why his Dad has gone". In an undated reply based on a stock letter the regional office promised Mr B that "all aspects of his case" would be checked. Welfare section reviewed the case again on 24 June and decided that the deduction from earnings order should remain in place. They asked whether the shared care issue had been investigated. In early July CSA decided that Mr B's departure application would need to await the outcome of the outstanding change in circumstances review. (There is no evidence that CSA informed Mr B).
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18. On 23 October Mr B wrote to the regional office manager and complained that his departure application had not been dealt with. He said that his assessment did not reflect the correct apportionment for shared care, in spite of CSA having a copy of the court order, and he referred, obliquely, to suicide. The customer services manager acknowledged the letter on 3 November and said that his points would be investigated once enquiries [of Ms A] were complete. Welfare section assessed Mr B's case again on 6 November. They considered that, as his weekly liability was about to be reduced, Mr B's threat was not serious. The manager agreed. They noted that arrears of £7,636.33 were due and that the case had been checked and was in order, subject to consideration of Mr B's outstanding request for departure. Attached to the report was a printout of the arrears. It showed two "initial" full maintenance assessments: one for £69.08, effective from 22 January 1996, and one for £70.13, effective from 22 January 1997.
19. Mr B wrote to the customer services manager on 7 November saying that hers was the first reply he had received to his correspondence in two years. He contrasted his personal situation to that of Ms A and repeated his submissions about the effect of the court order. He said that if he had to take his own life he would do so in a way which would publicise "the immorality that is the CSA". He pleaded for action even though he might be dead when his letter arrived. An officer at the regional office telephoned Mr B's at his work on 10 November. She told him that the outcome of the change of circumstances review would be notified shortly and that his departure application would then be given priority. She asked Mr B if he was satisfied that all the issues were being dealt with and he said that he did not agree with the amount of the arrears. She agreed to send him a breakdown of his account once the new maintenance assessment had been made. A second officer telephoned Mr B the next day and said that shared care would be reflected (again) in the new assessment and reminded him of his review and appeal rights if he remained dissatisfied. He said that he was satisfied that his complaints were being addressed to the best of CSA's ability but that he remained dissatisfied with the way in which his case had been handled.
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20. On 17 November the regional office notified both parents of a new maintenance assessment of £30.12 a week, effective from 6 May 1998. That reflected changes in Mr B's earnings and inclusion of an allowance based on shared care of 2_ days out of 7. In the two weeks from 18 November CSA received a number of letters from Mr B, including one addressed to the responsible Minister. All mentioned that he had been on the brink of suicide for some time. He described how he had sat down with a bottle of whisky and painkillers but had passed out before damaging himself. He complained about the treatment of his applications for departure and shared care. He asked for a full arrears breakdown, a proper review of his case and a fair maintenance assessment. He said he had suffered "eight months of total hardship and severe depression". He could not face Christmas without money and that he could not live without his son. Mr B sent a copy of the court order with one of his letters. Meanwhile the regional office, at their own discretion, reviewed the maintenance assessments again, revising liability to £34.32 a week effective from 4 February 1998 and £24.36 a week effective from 6 May 1998. They told both parents on 2 December. On 4 December the regional office reduced Mr B's liability from 4 February 1998 to £31.44 a week under the departure arrangements. On 8 December the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Social Security wrote to Mr B. She explained the recent changes to his maintenance assessment and confirmed that CSA had now accepted his apportionment (of 46.3%) of shared care. She said that the assessment from 6 May would also need to be revised to take account of the decision on departure. (CSA subsequently decided that that assessment remained unaltered.) The Minister said that the latest deduction from earnings order in the amount of £35.22 a week (including £5.10 toward arrears) would also be revised to take account of his reduced liability. She recognised that CSA's actions had clearly distressed Mr B but that CSA made every effort to carry out their legal liabilities sensitively and accurately. On 21 December Mr B submitted detailed grounds challenging the departure decision. He asked the regional office to reassess his case properly, "once and for all". On 23 December Mr B wrote that his letter would be the last CSA got from him and he said that they were claiming arrears of "thousands of pounds".
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21. 1999 On 10 March 1999 the referring Member wrote to the regional office manager enclosing a copy of a letter from Mr B. Mr B asked the appeals unit on 12 April when he could expect to hear the outcome of his appeal against the departure decision. He said it was a matter of life and death, that he had tried to kill himself twice and that he was currently under the care of his doctor. On 23 April the regional office manager sent a full reply to the Member recounting the various changes in maintenance assessments. He apologised that it had taken some six months (to November 1998) to complete the review of Mr B's changed circumstances - his reduced earnings - but that the effective date was 6 May 1998. When liability was reduced any amount overpaid had to be offset against outstanding arrears. The manager explained that Mr B's deduction from earnings order collected £5.10 toward arrears, the minimum accepted by CSA in all cases. He also said that efforts would be made to process Mr B's appeal urgently. On the matter of suicide he said that CSA made every effort to ensure that legal liabilities were carried out sensitively and accurately. Welfare section (who had seen Mr B's latest letter) decided on 27 April not to take any further action.
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22. Mr B replied on 7 May to the manager's letter to the Member posing many technical questions. He complained that CSA staff had behaved callously at "an unbelievably distressing time" and that his suicide attempts had been real. He said that the regional office had received at least four copies of the court order during 1998 (though there is no evidence from the papers of that). He said that he had repeatedly asked for a breakdown of his arrears. Mr B said that the regional office had sent him an arrears bill of £10,000 exactly 70 weeks after Ms A had applied for maintenance. Given his then liability the amount should have been £4,900 (70 x £70). He asked for a detailed statement of account. The regional office replied on 25 May. They said they were sorry that Mr B had felt CSA had been responsible for his suicide attempts but could add nothing to the manager's explanations. They said that a computer-generated account had been actioned that day. (Such an account was sent to Mr B on 26 May but consisted purely of his deduction from earnings order payments.)
23. On 17 June the regional office sent Mr B an account breakdown. That showed a total liability of £9,206.62 (including £3,611.91 between 22 January 1996 and 21 January 1997). Given that payments received under deduction from earnings orders then amounted to £2,620.85 the regional office said that Mr B's arrears of maintenance stood at £6,585.77. They sent an updated version on 5 July after it became apparent that Mr B had not received the 17 June letter. On 6 July Mr B wrote to the regional office challenging the arrears figure, which he said had taken 18 months to obtain. He wrote more expressly on 12 July pointing out that a liability from 22 January 1996 pre-dated Ms A's application by nine months. By that time the Ombudsman's staff were making informal enquiries of CSA about Mr B's case. On 5 August the regional office finally recognised that Mr B had been overcharged by £3,611.91 as a result of using a wrong initial effective date. They subsequently adjusted the accounts accordingly and on 24 August sent Mr B a revised account breakdown with arrears at £2,913.39. A tribunal dismissed Mr B's appeal against the departure decision on 14 September.
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CSA's comments on the complaint
24. The Chief Executive readily accepted and apologised for the fact that CSA had poorly handled Mr B's case. She regretted that the effective date of the first maintenance assessment had been wrongly recorded as 22 January 1996 on CSA's computer system; and that the error had not been corrected until 5 August 1999. The Chief Executive also acknowledged that Mr B's shared care of his son had not been taken into account, in accordance with the court order held by CSA since February 1998, until 1 December 1998; and that there had been a delay of several months in reviewing an assessment to reflect a reduction in Mr B's earnings. The Chief Executive concluded that Mr B had tried hard to resolve matters and that, had staff taken the time to explain issues to him and acted more efficiently, many of the problems could have been avoided. She said that CSA's special payments team would consider making a compensation payment to Mr B.
Subsequent developments
25. On 23 November the special payments team awarded Mr B £50 for gross inconvenience arising out of the error concerning the overcharge of £3,611.91. They considered, however, that large arrears of maintenance had accumulated in any event because Mr B had failed to make any payments until the operation of the deduction from earnings order in late May 1998. They did not consider that CSA's errors had caused Mr B to sustain bank charges and refused to reimburse those. They also considered that Mr B had not incurred additional out of pocket expenses as a result of CSA errors. In the light of a letter prepared by Mr B's own doctor CSA accepted in January 2000 that their actions in chasing Mr B for arrears miscalculated by £3611.91 had caused him severe distress. They made a consolatory payment of £250 to him for that.
26. The regional office made further maintenance assessments of £22.79 a week effective from 1 December 1999 and £22.04 a week effective from 12 January 2000. Regular maintenance and arrears at £5.10 a week continue to be collected by means of a deduction from earnings order.
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Findings
27. In Mr B's case the regional office were able to make a relatively quick maintenance assessment in early February 1997. Most unfortunately they made an avoidable error in entering the wrong year for the effective date. That was to have serious consequences for Mr B since it took CSA 2.5 years to realise that, as a result, they had been over-calculating arrears of maintenance by some £3,600. To any CSA official looking at the papers the error should have been obvious given the crucial timing of the issue of the maintenance enquiry form (paragraph 13.4). There were many opportunities for the error to have been corrected. Indeed within a day or two of the error a supervisor appears to have spotted it (paragraph 13.11). As I understand the position one of the important functions of the welfare section is to carry out a check that the figures are correct (as per printed entry on welfare reports - paragraph 13.13). Nevertheless in their reviews in July, August and October 1997 welfare section failed to spot the mistake; and the position was even more glaring when in November 1998 they did not investigate a print-out showing two "initial" assessments (paragraph 13.18).
28. The regional office failed also to look into Mr B's protestations. In his letter of 12 June 1997 (paragraph 13.12), written within four weeks of receiving an arrears bill of almost £5,000, Mr B had given his own estimation - accurate as it would turn out - that the amount ought to have been around £1,400. He specifically asked how the arrears had been calculated. I see it as a failure to answer the last point at all as constituting another lost chance to sort things out fairly quickly. Similarly on 31 March 1998 (paragraph 13.15) Mr B had been right again in putting the then arrears in the region of £4,200. That communication too went unanswered, a further matter for concern. In November 1998 the regional office promised to send Mr B a breakdown of his account after the maintenance assessment had been revised (paragraph 13.19). Although the ensuing round of reviews had been completed about three weeks later, on 4 December, the regional office again failed to act. It was not until 17 June 1999, two years after his original request, that the regional office complied. Although it appears that Mr B did not receive the letter (paragraph 13.23), he was nevertheless quickly able to spot the error for himself once he had seen a proper financial statement soon afterwards.
29. Finally there were the opportunities created by Mr B's appeals and requests for review. As part of their standard preparations CSA's appeals unit would have prepared factual statements for the tribunals hearing Mr B's appeals in October 1997 and March 1998. I conclude that CSA's collective failings constituted persistent error over a very long time.
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30. By his own admission Mr B had been struggling with his personal finances before CSA's involvement in his case. Plainly too he was distressed from the outset at the prospect of meeting the maintenance assessment imposed (see paragraph 13.11). All the more distressing it must have been for him to receive an initial notification of arrears in May 1997 which turned out to be so wildly inaccurate: in rounded figures £4,900 rather than £1,300.
31. I now examine Mr B's complaint that CSA took too long to deal with aspects of his case and failed properly to take into account material put to them. Those aspects were the shared care application, the reduction in Mr B's earnings, and his departure application. According to the regional office's papers Mr B first mentioned on 31 March 1998 that a court order relating to his access to his son had been made on 26 January of that year (paragraph 13.15). I can find no trace of a copy reaching Mr B's file until around November (paragraph 13.20). I note from the Chairman's remarks that CSA had held a copy of the court order as early as February, and that may well have been supplied by Ms A who had referred to it. Be that as it may, the regional office ought to have asked Mr B for a copy in order properly to be able to carry out the necessary adjustments to the maintenance assessment. As it was the regional office's first re-assessment on 1 June (paragraph 13.16) took into account only the fortnightly care arrangements mentioned in the order and not also the shared care specified during all school holidays (which had informed Mr B's figure of 46.3% - paragraph 13.17). Although the regional office eventually modified the maintenance assessment in that way, arguably they should have got it right first time.
32. The regional office manager has apologised to the referring Member for the length of time it had taken to complete Mr B's change in circumstances review (paragraph 13.21). Given that the welfare section manager had asked on 26 May 1998 for that review to be completed as a priority (paragraph 13.16) it is very regrettable that Mr B should have had to wait until mid-November. Given too that the regional office was already looking at shared care it would have been much more efficient in my view for them to have completed the two tasks together. That could have been done once the outcome of their enquiries of Mr B's employer, made on 1 June, was known.
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33. Although an early decision had been taken within CSA to defer consideration of Mr B's departure application, they did not inform him of that (paragraph 13.17). In the final analysis the regional office's eventual decision on 4 December 1998 made only a marginal difference to Mr B's maintenance assessment and for some three months only, a decision subsequently upheld by a tribunal. The main effect of my findings in paragraphs 13.31 and 13.32 above is that, had the regional office acted in a more focused and co-ordinated way, they could have completed both the review of Mr B's earnings and a fully-informed consideration of his shared care application in around late June 1998, some five months earlier. That delay did not alter the total amount of maintenance owed by Mr B, because the revised assessments were properly applied retrospectively, but it did cause Mr B to pay more in regular maintenance (under a deduction from earnings order) than he needed to have done.
34. I now consider whether CSA treated Mr B's case sympathetically. As I see it another function of welfare section is to create a reasonable pause for mature reflection in cases coming to their attention. The instructions imply, properly, that CSA should not be deflected from their statutory obligations merely because of a threat of self-harm. Nevertheless the regional office failed to consult welfare section in May 1997 when they first received such intimation from Mr B (paragraph 13.11). While welfare section informed Mr B the following month that action in his case had been suspended I can find no evidence that they followed up that, essentially holding, letter. That omission not only conflicted with the instructions (paragraph 13.7) but also went back on an undertaking given to Mr B (paragraph 13.12).
35. In other respects welfare section's involvement had (or should have had) some beneficial effect. In October 1997 they gave detailed instructions about the level of recovery of arrears of maintenance (paragraph 13.14); and acted similarly in May 1998 once a deduction from earnings order had been put in place (paragraph 13.16). In one important area, however, there appears to have been a breakdown in communication within CSA. In referring to Mr B's evident distress welfare section said in October 1997 that the regional office would need to negotiate sensitively with Mr B over the matter of his accumulating arrears. Arguably that called for a CSA official to speak with Mr B, whether from the regional office or through Mr B's local field office, the latter perhaps by personal interview. I see no evidence that any such contact was made. Rather on 1 May 1998 the regional office simply informed Mr B that they had made a deduction from earnings order. To my mind that constituted insensitive handling.
36. Any decision to make a deduction from earnings order is a discretionary one for CSA to take according to the individual circumstances of the case. Given that Mr B was in paid employment and had made no effort to pay any maintenance from February 1997 he was clearly the potential subject of enforcement action. It must be a matter of speculation as to whether Mr B would have made efforts to pay regular maintenance and a contribution toward his arrears had CSA approached him. It might well have been that the only way CSA could secure payment of maintenance to Ms A was through a deduction from earnings order. But I regard the timing of the decision in the circumstances I have outlined as being contrary to the sound lead given by welfare section and, in turn, as having caused additional distress to Mr B. I find it somewhat mystifying in the context that the first apparent attempt to explain matters to Mr B had been in the two telephone calls from the regional office in November 1998 (paragraph 13.19). I note that Mr B appears at least to have appreciated the intent behind those calls, even though they did not persuade him that his case had been handled properly.
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37. All in all the regional office's handling of this case was poor. Although the original error was a human one - entering the wrong effective date on to CSA's computer - the regional office missed countless opportunities to correct that fundamental mistake. Given welfare section's involvement, they could and should have done more to re-assess Mr B' maintenance assessment more quickly and accurately than they did. They also failed adequately to engage with Mr B before making the deduction from earnings order. In the circumstances it appeared to me that the special payments unit had probably under-estimated both the inconvenience CSA's actions had caused and the adverse impact upon Mr B's health. Accordingly I asked the Chief Executive if she would be prepared to have the level of the consolatory payments made to Mr B looked at again. In reply she said that, following a review, the special payments unit had decided to award Mr B a further £100 for gross inconvenience and a further £100 for worry and stress, making £500 in all (paragraph 13.25).
Conclusion
38. I regard the Chief Executive's apologies and CSA's decision to make consolatory payments totalling £500 to Mr B as constituting a suitable outcome to a justified complaint.
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