Decision Report 201805785

Summary

Ms C, an advocate, complained on behalf of her client (Ms A). Ms A contacted the partnership to request a self-directed support assessment. A number of efforts were made to arrange a meeting to complete the assessment, however, after a number of months the partnership expressed concerns about the difficulty in progressing the assessment. They advised Ms A that her case would be suspended until a later date so that the case worker could progress other work. Ms A complained that the partnership failed to make reasonable adjustments in light of her communication needs. Ms A said that she wanted the partnership to fund her preferred interpreter service.

We took independent equalities advice. We found that the partnership made an interpreter available for meetings and made reasonable efforts to accommodate all those that Ms A wished to have in attendance at meetings. We also found that the partnership permitted Ms A to use her own preferred interpreter, however, we did not consider they were required to fund that service as they had already made a service available. We did not uphold the complaint.