Can you help me get £10,000 owed to me by the care home provider Leicestershire County Care?

My husband was resident in one of their care homes before he died in June last year. Because our savings had dropped below the ­government threshold for self-funded care, the local authority had agreed to pay the £5,000-a-month cost. However, by the time it ­completed its assessment last May, I’d had to pay a further five months of fees myself.

The council sent a backdated payment for those qualifying months to Leicestershire County Care, which was supposed to refund me the £23,000 that I’d paid. It eventually paid me £13,000 but I’ve received nothing more since October. Whenever I contact the company, they always claim the next payment is “imminent” or has been paid when it hasn’t.

JH, Leicestershire

This is financial and emotional stress that you could have done without while grieving for your husband. In the latest letter assuring you that the balance would be paid by Christmas Eve (it wasn’t), Leicestershire County Care, which is part of Johnson Care Group, blamed a “significant backlog” for the delay. A further £5,000 was sent to you just after you contacted me in January, but there was no word of the outstanding £5,000. The company operates 12 care homes in Leicestershire, so how many other families were affected, I asked. No answer was forthcoming.

Johnson Care’s attitude is startlingly cavalier. It refused to comment other than to say it reviews cases internally and would “communicate the outcome” to you. I tried the council, whose money is being withheld by the firm. It said it would work with Johnson to ensure the funds were transferred. Four weeks passed. Nothing happened. I rattled the cages of council and provider and finally, at the end of February and eight months late, the last instalment arrived.

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