Decision Report 201407031

Summary

Miss C complained about the final account issued by the council for statutory repair works which had been undertaken on a flat she owned in Edinburgh. The project had been the subject of independent review, and further works had been undertaken (for which she had not been charged). There had been an overall reduction in the bill. However, Miss C complained to us about the council's 15 percent administration fee, because she considered this was inappropriate on top of the amount assessed by the independent review. She also complained about the tone of the council's response to her returning the discharge form with agreement to paying her share of the works minus the administration fee.

In response to our enquiry, the council said they had a legal entitlement to recover the administrative fee, and this had been reduced in line with the reduction to the final account. They explained that the company that undertook the independent review had, in some cases, made recommendations to partially or fully waive the council's administrative fee, but had not done so in this instance. Taking this advice into account, we did not uphold the complaint. Miss C had also asked for the reimbursement of her share of the cost of expenses incurred by the owners for professional services, but as this had also been considered as part of the review and a decision taken not to pay, we considered we had no grounds to challenge this.

We did uphold Miss C's complaint about the tone of the council's letter, and noted from our enquiry to the council that they accepted that her complaint was justified and were addressing the concerns which had been raised.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• apologise to Miss C for the tone of the letter sent to her by the council.