Date of decision: 26 March 2026
Summary
An adult son complained that the Council failed to warn the family that his mother’s home care, arranged on discharge from hospital, would be chargeable from the very first day. The family had repeatedly been led to expect six weeks of free intermediate or reablement care and received no written information about charges, leaving the mother facing an unexpected invoice of over £2,000.
What happened
Mrs Y, an older woman, was admitted to hospital after a fall in which she sustained a back injury. Her hospital discharge plan, dated 31 March 2025, set therapy goals for her to progress at home in her own environment, reduce the number of care calls and increase her independence within six weeks, before referral for any long‑term care package. On 2 April 2025, the Council visited her in hospital to discuss discharge, recorded that she wished to return home with a package of care, and noted it would source a double‑manned care package and complete a financial assessment to determine what she would have to contribute; Mrs Y agreed to the financial assessment.
That same day the Council submitted a request to its reablement service for four double‑manned calls per day for Mrs Y. On 3 April 2025, the reablement service informed the Council it had no availability for the level of support requested, so the Council turned instead to private care providers to source a package of care. On 4 April 2025, the Council telephoned Mr X, Mrs Y’s son, explaining it had visited Mrs Y, that she wanted to be discharged with a package of care, and that it was in the process of sourcing this support.
At Mr X’s request, the Council met with Mrs Y and Mr X in hospital on 7 April to discuss discharge. The hospital confirmed Mrs Y could be discharged with a frame, no longer needed support or supervision to mobilise and could transfer independently from bed or chair; the Council recorded that she agreed to a package of care with four calls a day. Finances were discussed, and Mr X said he did not know whether Mrs Y’s savings were above or below the capital limit; the Council’s records say it told Mrs Y it would complete a financial assessment to determine her contribution towards the cost of care “from day one” and that she agreed to this.
On 8 April 2025, the Council approached private care providers about a package of four calls a day which no longer needed to be double‑manned, indicating her needs had reduced by the discharge date. On 9 April, the Council phoned Mrs Y to ask if she was happy with the proposed call times and she confirmed she was. On 1 May 2025, Mr X received a Council letter stating that Mrs Y was liable to pay the full cost of her care, backdated to 9 April.
On 12 May 2025, Mr X cancelled Mrs Y’s care package because she no longer needed support and the same day complained to the Council about the care charges. He said the family had been told on three occasions, including by Mrs Y’s social worker, that the first six weeks of care would be free of charge before a financial assessment decided what, if anything, she must pay; he said that from 9 April onwards the Council had never told them the care was chargeable or what it would cost, and that if they had known it was chargeable they would have scrutinised whether care was actually needed rather than simply focusing on getting her home.
The Council’s initial complaint response of 14 May stated that it had visited on 2 April when Mrs Y agreed to a financial assessment, held a discharge planning meeting on 7 April, assessed that she needed four daily calls to enable safe discharge, and that it was agreed these would be sourced. It said finances were discussed on 7 April and that the social worker told them care would be chargeable from day one, apologising only if hospital staff had given incorrect information about six weeks’ free care. Mr X replied that it was untrue the social worker had said payment was due from day one and asked the Council to confirm this with the hospital staff member who had attended the 7 April meeting, also stating that if he had been told the care was chargeable he would have asked what it would cost.
In a complaint review response on 13 June 2025, the Council said hospital staff could not confirm the content of the 7 April conversation. It also said it had reminded the hospital to make staff aware the Council does not automatically offer non‑chargeable care services on discharge. Mr X responded that the Council was missing the point and requested copies of any written correspondence to him or Mrs Y setting out the cost of the care package or the start date of any contract, and any correspondence showing that he or Mrs Y had agreed to the charge and the start date; he argued it was unacceptable to backdate an invoice for an amount never quoted or explained and said people have a right to expect accurate and relevant advice from the Council.
On 1 July 2025, the Council issued its final complaint response. It said it could not confirm how much a person must contribute until a financial assessment was completed and therefore did not provide written correspondence until it had an outcome; it said that on 16 April it had directed Mr X to its website to complete an online assessment and view a leaflet explaining what Mrs Y should expect to pay, and that it had explained funding processes to both Mrs Y and Mr X on 7 April.
In his complaint to the Ombudsman, Mr X said that while Mrs Y was very ill, a doctor and a nurse had told the family she needed care but that it would be free for six weeks, and this was then confirmed by a social worker who came to discuss discharge. He maintained that no one had told the family the care would be chargeable from day one, that they received nothing in writing about charging or the cost, and that had they known the care was chargeable they might have asked for her to remain in hospital longer given she was improving and would not have rushed into a home care package.
The Council told the Ombudsman it had verbal discussions about charging with Mrs Y and her family on 2 and 7 April 2025 and had recorded these in Mrs Y’s case records; it noted she received about five weeks of support before cancelling the care package once she was managing independently. The Council explained it had first asked the reablement service for four double‑manned calls a day, that the reablement service had no capacity at that point, and that it then requested a chargeable care package from providers instead. However, by the time of discharge Mrs Y’s needs had reduced such that she no longer required double‑manned care; the Council accepted it should have gone back to the reablement service at that stage to see if it now had capacity but had not done so.
The Council also acknowledged there was no clear recorded evidence that the distinction between the reablement service (a non‑chargeable intermediate care route) and a sourced chargeable care package had been fully explained to Mrs Y and her family. It said its usual practice, if reablement capacity is lacking, is to request a non‑chargeable bridging service first and then revisit reablement when capacity becomes available before moving to a chargeable package, and accepted it should have explained this process more clearly to the family. The Council further said it could not confirm that a written record of Mrs Y’s short‑term assessment was given to her or her family at the time, and told the Ombudsman it had since strengthened practice so that a copy is now handed directly to the individual or issued immediately following discharge.
Recognising it had not followed its advisory practice, the Council apologised and offered to reimburse the full cost of Mrs Y’s care from 9 April to 14 May 2025 to remedy the injustice.
What was found
The Ombudsman noted the statutory framework under the Care Act 2014 and the Care and Support (Discharge of Hospital Patients) Regulations 2014, [which the investigator wrongly believed are still in force, having been repealed along with the old schedule on hospital discharge] require the Council to assess needs for care and support on discharge, arrange suitable services promptly, and ensure people receive clear information and advice about care and charges, including for intermediate care and reablement that should usually be free for up to six weeks. In Mrs Y’s case, the Ombudsman found it was always envisaged that she would receive intermediate or reablement support at home before any long‑term package and that the Council’s initial request to the reablement service on 2 April aligned with that expectation.
The Ombudsman found fault because when the reablement service initially had no availability, the Council moved straight to commissioning a chargeable private care package but did not evidence telling Mrs Y or her family that it had tried and failed to secure reablement. The Council also accepted it did not then consider a non‑chargeable bridging service, even though it recognised this should have been the next step under its usual procedures; this omission was further fault. By the time Mrs Y was ready for discharge, and her needs had reduced so she no longer required double‑manned care, the Council should have re‑approached the reablement service to check for capacity but did not do so, which the Ombudsman also treated as fault.
Overall, the Ombudsman concluded that the Council failed to follow its own procedures for sourcing reablement support at discharge and failed to provide proper, clear advice to Mrs Y and her family about the nature of the service and the associated charging, contrary to the information and advice duties in the Care Act statutory guidance. These failures left Mrs Y facing an unexpected bill for over £2,000 and caused distress and frustration to her and to Mr X, and Mr X was put to avoidable time and trouble bringing his complaint to the Ombudsman because the Council did not itself identify these faults during its own complaint process.
The Ombudsman considered the Council’s offer to reimburse the full cost of care between 9 April and 14 May 2025 to be an appropriate financial remedy for Mrs Y’s injustice and noted the additional £100 payment to Mr X to recognise his time and trouble. The Ombudsman also welcomed the Council’s acknowledgement of fault and its commitment to practice changes, including the issuing of written short‑term assessments and improving clarity around the distinction between reablement and chargeable care. As part of the agreed action, the Council must apologise to Mrs Y for failing to follow procedures and for the impact, reimburse the full care costs, pay £100 to Mr X, and, within eight weeks of the final decision, provide refresher training to Adult Social Care staff on hospital discharge and reablement procedures. Within eight weeks of my final decision, the Council agreed to provide refresher training to staff in its Adult Social Care service about the Council’s procedures on hospital discharge and reablement care.
Points to note for councils, professionals, people using services and their carers, advocacy groups and members of the public
The Council’s failure to secure free reablement or a bridging service, and to warn clearly about charges, sits uneasily with the legal framework on intermediate care, charging and information duties as understood in community care law. Intermediate care and reablement arranged under the Care Act must be provided free of charge for up to six weeks; this protection is framed as a prohibition on charging, not a discretionary subsidy. The charging regulations specifically bar local authorities from levying any charge for intermediate care and reablement during the defined period, so once a person is properly within that route, moving them into a chargeable package for reasons of internal capacity rather than clinical need risks undermining that protection.
The report notes that regulations require intermediate care and reablement to be provided without charge for up to six weeks, and that this is for all adults able to benefit from that sort of a service, whether or not they have eligible needs for ongoing care and support. The investigator’s analysis stops short of squarely asking whether the authority’s inability to find internal reablement cover can ever convert what is in substance a time‑limited, goal‑focused reablement programme into a chargeable home‑care package during the same six‑week window. The actual improvement of the woman, in terms of diminishing dependency, means the Council did have an evidence basis for a change of position, however – albeit that changing the care plan does not seem to have been something that the staff had done. Where a person is discharged on a plan whose documented aim is to regain independence within six weeks before consideration of any long‑term package, community care law would expect the authority to treat that programme as non‑chargeable reablement or as prevention, regardless of whether it must buy capacity from independent providers rather than through its in‑house reablement service.
A second area where the Ombudsman’s analysis is relatively narrow is the treatment of the authority’s information and advice duties around charging, financial assessment and written records. The decision criticises the lack of clear advice and the absence of written information, but does not link that failure to the specific statutory duties to give a written record of any financial assessment and to ensure that people know in advance what they may be expected to pay. Community care charging law stresses that once a council decides it will charge, it must carry out a financial assessment and provide a written record explaining how the assessment has been carried out, what the charge will be, how often it will be made and, if charges fluctuate, why.
Since most councils are hopelessly backed up with their financial assessments, it has become the practice to allow backdating as long as the person has been told about the fact of the charge and the rough approach to calculation. A public law analysis would emphasise that a council choosing to charge must put itself in a position to tell the person, at least in broad terms, what they are likely to pay, and must ensure that a written record of the assessment is issued promptly. Treating online signposting as adequate information and advice, where the person is acutely unwell and relying on verbal assurances from professionals at discharge, risks diluting the statutory requirement for clear, accessible and proactive communication about charges. It is the ignorance of hospital staff, discharge co-ordinators and the failure of local authorities to insist on some legal literacy through co-operation and integration functions that is causing this sort of issue, nationwide.
Please use the following link if you want to read the original Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s North Yorkshire Council (25 007 027) report. If you are affected by the issues in this report, please consider asking a free, one-off question, anonymously, at a level of principle, here. Our experts’ response will give you an opinion which may then help you and the broader community, when posted.
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