Office of the Public Guardian

3. Mr O complains that the OPG took too long to process his first LPA application, which it rejected, and then attributed the payment for his third LPA application to his second. He said that due to this he has experienced aggravation and frustration and would like compensation for his incurred expenses and for the OPG to change its process so applicants can see that their applications have been received.

4. Mr O submitted a HW LPA application to the OPG on 11 January 2023.

5. On 3 April, the OPG wrote a letter to Mr O telling him his application was invalid, so he needed to submit a new application.

6. On 26 April, he submitted a second HW LPA application by tracked post. This application was received by the OPG on 2 May, but he was told by the Royal Mail that this application had not been delivered and was lost.

7. Mr O submitted a third HW LPA application to the OPG which he signed on 8 June.

8. The OPG wrote to Mr O to request payment for his second application. He called the OPG on 15 June to discuss this payment as he believed his second application had been lost by the Royal Mail. On this call the OPG said it would use the payment from his third application on his second, and then it would scrap his third. The OPG did this, but it did not update the HW LPA’s payment status on the system.

9. Mr O complained to the OPG in June, and his MP signed his PHSO complaint form on 23 November.

HW LPA Applications

12. Before we decide if we should conduct a detailed investigation of a complaint, we look at whether there are signs the events complained about had a negative effect which the organisation has not put right. Having done so we have found the OPG has already done enough to put right the impact of these events on Mr O.

13. Mr O said that in January 2023 he made an application for a HW LPA, but his application was rejected because the witness failed to insert their address correctly. He said it took the OPG three months to reject this application, which was too long.

14. He said he then submitted a second HW LPA application which he sent recorded delivery via the Post Office, but the Royal Mail declared his application lost. He said he also received no confirmation from the OPG to say it had received it, so he submitted a third application online.

15. He said the OPG later asked him for the payment for his second application, which it had had all along. He said he told the OPG about the third application and the payment he had made, and it said it would use the payment from the third application for the second, and then it would scrap the third.

16. He said the OPG then did not update his second application’s status to show the payment had been made.

17. The OPG said Mr O submitted a HW LPA application in January 2023, which it ‘found to be invalid because the witness had failed to provide their name and address’. It said he then submitted a second application that it received on 2 May and scanned into the system on 30 May. It said Mr O then submitted a third application because he had been told by the Royal Mail that his second application had been lost.

18. It said that it wrote to Mr O requesting payment for his second application, which resulted in a call from him on 15 June where he said he had submitted a third application and made payment online. It said it was agreed that the online payment would be allocated to the second application, and that this was done, but the HW LPA payment status was not updated until Mr O told the OPG about its error, which it corrected urgently.

19. The UK Government Complaint Standards: Giving Fair and Accountable Responses says an organisation should ‘give a clear and balanced account of what happened’ if an offered service falls below what would normally be expected. It also says that ‘organisations [should] openly identify instances where things have gone wrong, or where services have had an unfair impact, and take responsibility for these.’

20. Our Guidance on Financial Remedy says that if ‘the person affected has experienced a low impact injustice such as annoyance, frustration, worry or inconvenience. This would typically arise from a single (one-off) incidence of maladministration or service failure, where the effect on the person complaining is of short duration, and where there are no other adverse effects or ongoing wider impact. We will usually consider an apology to be an appropriate remedy for these cases.’

21. We have seen that the OPG apologised to Mr O for the delay in processing his first application in its complaint response dated 11 August 2023, and that it gave an explanation as to the steps it had taken with his initial application and why the processing took the time it did.

22. We have also seen that the OPG apologised to Mr O for not updating the payment in its system after their call on 15 June, and that it took until 30 June before the payment was correctly allocated.

23. Based on the above, we have seen that there were some shortfalls in the service OPG provided to Mr O and it took longer than it would have liked to process his initial application and to update its records regarding his payment. We appreciate that this led to frustration for Mr O and annoyance when he had to contact the OPG again to resolve the issue of the payment.

24. We are, however, of the view that the OPG has already done enough to put things right, in line with the UK Government Complaint Standards and our own Guidance on Financial Remedy. It is clear that additional confusion caused by incorrect information about his second application provided by Royal Mail added to the problems Mr O experienced in trying to apply for his HW LPA. However, this was beyond the OPG’s control. Nor can we say that Mr O incurred additional costs because of any of OPG’s actions.

25. We understand the OPG’s delays would have caused frustration to Mr O, as may our decision. We hope he can now take some peace of mind in the knowledge that his complaint has been independently investigated.

1. We have carefully considered Mr O’s complaint about the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG). We have decided the OPG has already done enough to put right the impact of these events on Mr O. We have seen that the OPG has already apologised for the time it took to process his first Health and Welfare Lasting Power of Attorney (HW LPA) application, and for not correctly updating the payment on his second.

2. We understand Mr O may find our decision frustrating. We have provided a detailed explanation of our decision below.