Hertfordshire County Coucil had to pay out almost £10,000 in compensation last year due to complaints to the Local Government Ombudsman.

Complaints are only considered by the Ombudsman after a council’s own complaints procedures have been followed.

But a new report shows that last year, 2017/18, the Ombudsman investigated 32 complaints of ‘maladministration’ against the county council.

Of these, 20 were upheld – resulting in compensation to 12 complainants totalling £9,712.

Most of those payments related to complaints about adult care services, but others were for children's services and environment.

The data was presented to county councillors at a meeting of the resources and performance cabinet panel on Friday (December 14).

Meanwhile the report to the cabinet panel also showed that during the same period 1,079 complaints were made directly to the council – which is slightly higher than the previous year’s 1,059.

But the number of complaints was lower than the number of compliments, which was 1,086.

Most of the complaints related to adult care services (407) and children’s services (379).

Meanwhile adult care services was also the department to receive the highest number of compliments (231) – followed again by childrem’s services, with 201.

At the meeting it was noted that it was harder to capture compliments than complaints.