Wandsworth Council refused to help a homeless man who cannot speak because he would not turn up to a face-to-face meeting. He had asked instead to communicate in writing and by video call.
The man, referred to as Mr X in an official report, communicates only in writing. In September 2024, he asked Wandsworth to assess what care and support he needed but had several stipulations given his disabilities: questions 48 hours ahead of a meeting, an advocate, and no camera on during video calls, because of body dysmorphia.
The process fell apart and the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has since upheld his complaint. It found the council had delayed getting him an advocate for five months, never wrote down or confirmed the adjustments it had agreed with him, and did not explain why it needed a face-to-face meeting until after it had already shut his case.
The council has been told to apologise, pay him £500, reopen the assessment and issue new guidance to its own staff – which it has agreed to.
Five months, and back where he started
The council arranged an online assessment for the man in question in November 2024, nine weeks after he first asked for an advocate. But there was no advocate when he turned up and it turns out the council only asked for one the following month.
A second online meeting followed in January 2025, with an advocate present. The council had agreed to send him any questions 48 hours in advance but only sent them the evening before. The meeting went badly and his request for eight hours a day support was met with an offer of six hours a week. The council told him they needed to verify his health needs and he left the meeting.
Later that month, the council wrote to the address where he was sofa surfing, inviting him to a face-to-face assessment. He had asked the council not to write to that address and since apologised for doing so.
On 10 February 2025, the council closed his case. It told him it needed a face-to-face meeting to verify his eligibility and his support network, and that because he would not attend one, the assessment would not go ahead. He could come back, it said, when he was ready to engage.
He put in a complaint. The council’s first explanation of why it needed a face-to-face meeting did not arrive until April 2025, in its response to that complaint, by which point his case had already been shut for two months. When he escalated to a second stage in June, the council said it had nothing to add to what it had already told him, and did not engage with any of the specific points he had raised against its first response. The ombudsman found that a fault in its own right.
“Nothing has changed”
Answering the ombudsman’s questions on the case, the council proposed a different way forward: reopen the assessment with a new social worker, work with him by email only with his advocate involved, agree a written plan for how any verification with his GP would happen, and only consider an in-person meeting if it was genuinely necessary, with a clear explanation of why. It offered to do this, it told the ombudsman, “to reflect good administrative practice rather than because it accepted any fault.”
That offer is close to what the man asked for in September 2024. The ombudsman’s decision puts it plainly: “I am unclear why the Council could not have arranged a further online assessment in 2025 as nothing has changed between then and now.”
The decision does not say whether he has been assessed since or whether he has anywhere to live now.
A deadline that has passed
The council had one month from the ombudsman’s decision, dated 2 July 2026, to apologise, pay him, and contact him to arrange the reopened assessment.
This is the eighteenth Putney.news story involving an ombudsman ruling against Wandsworth Council since May 2025. In June, the ombudsman found the council had taken so long over another care assessment that the person had given up before the council acted. What the ombudsman has ordered this time includes more guidance for officers, which is what the council keeps being told to write; in April, we counted the same promise six times. The department has been here before, too, including the resident who opened the post to find a £40,000 bill nobody had mentioned.
If you’ve had an adjustment agreed and then ignored
If a council or public body agrees a reasonable adjustment with you, ask for it in writing and ask them to confirm what has been agreed. The ombudsman expects public bodies to record this and share it with the person involved.
A care needs assessment does not have to be done face to face. The Care Act’s guidance sets out several formats a council can use, including online, by phone, or a supported self-assessment you complete together with the council. If you would find it easier to be supported by someone else, you can ask the council to consider an independent advocate from the start.
If something goes wrong, Wandsworth Council’s complaints process runs in two stages: it aims to acknowledge a complaint within five working days and give a full response within 15 working days at stage one, and 25 working days at stage two. Adult social care complaints follow their own route rather than the same numbering, aiming to resolve most complaints within 25 working days. If you are still not satisfied, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman is free: lgo.org.uk, 0300 061 0614.
Has a reasonable adjustment you agreed with a public body been ignored, missed, or never confirmed in writing? Get in touch.
