Late couple distressed by care bill errors - report

Oxfordshire County Council said it accepted the ombudsman's findings

A council sent inflated home care bills to a couple who suffered "significant distress" and later died, an investigation has found.

Oxfordshire County Council overcharged the couple and did not fully respond to their complaints, the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) said.

During the ombudsman's inquiry into the case, the council admitted that a total of nine clients had been overcharged and reimbursed.

The council said it had relied on care providers to submit accurate records and would monitor them closely in future.

The complainant's wife was sent a series of invoices for overdue balances of between £3,000 and £4,500 from 2022-24, according to the report.

However, he repeatedly challenged the charges, which he said did not include payments he had already made.

The complainant also said he had been billed for non-existent home visits and was still being charged after her care ended in April 2023.

On one invoice, "the majority of the visits recorded were fraudulent", he alleged.

The council told the ombudsman it accepted the information provided by its care contractor was not accurate.

It said it had stopped using a previous system that recorded home visit times.

The ombudsman said: "We find the Council was at fault for delay and lack of consideration of Mr X's requests and failing to properly explain how it had reached the figures for the corrected charges."

It added: "There is no evidence to suggest [previous payments have] been taken into account when calculating the final balance. This is fault.

"This has caused significant distress to Mr and Mrs X. Mr X has spent unnecessary time and trouble in repeatedly asking the Council to consider his request."

The council offered £250 compensation but did not pay it, the ombudsman found.

The LGO ordered a full review of the charges and an extra £200 in compensation to the couple's son.

In a statement, the council said: "We accept the decision of the ombudsman and have made improvements on how we contract with care providers and monitor their performance, to ensure events of this nature do not happen again in the future."