Some residents go straight to the independent watchdog before giving their council's own complaints process a chance; the watchdog sends these back for the council to handle first. This counts those sent-back complaints. It matters as a signal about awareness and trust rather than fault: a high number suggests residents don't know about, or don't believe in, the council's own process — not that the council did anything wrong.
| name | lgsco_referred_back |
|---|---|
| dataset | 09-ombudsman-lgsco |
| kind | extracted |
| type | count |
| unit | complaints/year |
| grain | council-year |
| role | feature |
| source | data/lgsco/2-Complaints-Decided-{yy}-{yy}.csv, column `Referred Back for Local Resolution` |
| period | 2023-24 and 2024-25 editions |
| missingness | Rows exist only for councils in scope of LGSCO; `Upheld decisions per 100,000 residents` and rate columns are blank for zero-decision councils. Percent columns in file 2 are strings like `67%`. Join to Housing Ombudsman data is by name and lossy (ALMO/association names don't match council names). |
| score_note | Premature-complaint volume; signals resident awareness, not council fault. |
| peer_group | council class (district / county / unitary / metropolitan / London) — not yet scored on the leaderboard |
Premature complaints sent back to the council's own complaints process. A signal about residents bypassing (or not being aware of) the local process rather than about council fault.