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Southern Housing (202336236)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202336236

Southern Housing

28 August 2025

 

Our approach

The Housing Ombudsman’s approach to investigating and determining complaints is to decide what is fair in all the circumstances of the case. This is set out in the Housing Act 1996 and the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme). The Ombudsman considers the evidence and looks to see if there has been any ‘maladministration’, for example whether the landlord has failed to keep to the law, followed proper procedure, followed good practice or behaved in a reasonable and competent manner.

Both the resident and the landlord have submitted information to the Ombudsman and this has been carefully considered. Their accounts of what has happened are summarised below. This report is not an exhaustive description of all the events that have occurred in relation to this case, but an outline of the key issues as a background to the investigation’s findings.

The complaint

  1. Your complaint is about the landlord’s handling of the utilities aspect of the service charge and the associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is a leaseholder of the landlord, who owns the freehold. Her property is a flat in a block.
  2. The landlord reissued the 2021 to 2022 service charge statement for the resident’s block end of 2022 or beginning of 2023 (exact date unknown). In response the resident requested financial details on the reserve fund and the communal electricity costs. She raised concerns that the costs were significantly higher than expected, which they had also been the previous year. It attributed this to the previous energy supplier issuing inflated estimated bills. The new supplier agreed to look into the matter.
  3. The resident raised a complaint with the landlord on 14 July 2023. She said she expected to hear from it with answers about the electricity charges 3 weeks earlier. She said residents had paid excessive charges and found its lack of urgency regarding the matter unacceptable.
  4. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 8 August 2023. It explained the previous energy supplier (supplier A) had continually issued estimated electricity bills. It had changed supplier (supplier B) on 21 October 2022 who had taken up the issue with supplier A. It aimed to secure a refund which it committed to crediting back to the account. It indicated that any resolution may take some time.
  5. The resident’s complaint went to stage 2 of the landlord’s complaint process. A copy of the request has not been seen so the exact date is unknown.
  6. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 11 December 2023. It explained the range of factors that had impacted the increased cost of the resident’s energy charges. It confirmed the new supplier had secured a rebate, which had been credited to the account. However, it had not shown this in her service charge statement. It apologised for this error.
  7. The resident was not satisfied with the landlord’s response and escalated her complaint to this Service. She said it had not explained the increase in energy costs or why it had taken 2 years to resolve.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident’s complaint centres around the high level of service charge for electricity costs. We will not normally assess complaints that relate to the level, reasonableness, or liability to pay rent or service charges. We will however assess the landlord’s communication about the charges and response to the resident’s queries. If the resident wishes to pursue this aspect of her complaint, this would be a matter for the First Tier Tribunal. She can seek advice from the leasehold advisory service.

Service charge and the associated complaint

  1. The lease requires that the resident refunds the landlord, on demand, a fair proportion (determined by the landlord) of its outgoings, relating to the whole or part of the building. It outgoings would include its energy costs for the communal areas of the building.
  2. The resident had concerns about the continuing rise in cost of the energy charges for the block. She emailed the landlord on 14 February 2023 following receipt of the reissued service charge statement for 2021 to 2022. She asked it for full details of the £18,028.70 spent from the reserve fund and full details of the communal electricity and lighting. She said the expected cost was £3,035.04but the actual cost was £13,545.32, which had quadrupled.
  3. The landlord responded on 23 February 2023. It sent the resident a list of the invoices and transactions which made up the 2021 to 2022 year-end for reserve fund and electricity. This was a reasonable and timely response to her request.
  4. The resident queried with the landlord on 24 February 2023 why the address on the electricity breakdown document was not the address of her block. She raised concerns that it was paying the electricity charges for neighbouring buildings not on the estate.
  5. The landlord looked into her concerns and on 31 March 2023 it emailed her with its findings. The address was the name of the former site, before her block was built, which the energy suppliers still used. It assured her it had checked the meter point administration number and it was the correct one for her block. Again this was an appropriate and timely response.
  6. The resident emailed the landlord again on the 1 April 2023. She said the information it had given her did not explain why the communal electricity bill had doubled and quadrupled in the last 2 years. She wanted to know if anything had changed that might increase usage and why it had not noticed these increases.
  7. In its response of 17 April 2023 the landlord explained that supplier A had issued invoices on estimated readings which were inflated. It had raised this with the supplier during this time, but they continued to send estimated bills. It said supplier B was aware previous billings were based on estimates and was taking this up with supplier ‘A’. It was confident this would result in a refund, but had been warned by supplier B it could take up to 6 weeks. It confirmed supplier B was using actual readings, so the issue should not arise in future.
  8. The resident chased the landlord on 13 June 2023. It responded on 16 June, within its 5-day email response time. It advised the team were still working on her enquiry. It said when it had the information to share it would contact her.
  9. The resident raised her complaint on 14 July 2023 as she had chased twice more and not received the information she was waiting for. It emailed her on 18 July 2023, and apologised for the delay in replying. It had not received a response from supplier B, but was still chasing them.
  10. Understandably the resident wanted the issue resolved quickly. However, the landlord had relayed a timeline for resolution that was estimated by the energy supplier. The issue was in the hands of the two energy suppliers, the timing of which was outside of the landlord’s control. That it did not have an answer within the 6 weeks was not a service failure.
  11. The landlord’s response on 8 August 2023 apologised that the matter was still ongoing. It explained it had done what it could in the process which was to authorise supplier B to lodge a dispute with supplier A. It had been warned this may take time to resolve. It said it was committed to working with supplier B until it received the refund.
  12. The landlord considered the estimated bills to be a driver in the higher cost of electricity for the block. As such, there was little else it could do other than wait for the energy suppliers to agree a refund.
  13. The landlord’s stage 2 response on 11 December 2023 went to great lengths to explain the factors that had contributed to the residents increased energy charges. These included national price rises from 2021 to 2022, impacted by unstable global markets and the war in Ukraine. The fixed price contract it had secured with supplier A had been exceptionally low. When it expired, the lowest offer it could secure was significantly higher.
  14. The landlord also said supplier B had calculated that it had been overcharged £8,874.90 through the previously estimated bills. This was credited to the end of year accounts, but it had failed to show it in the resident’s annual statement. It apologised for this error. It said it had taken lessons from her complaint and would ensure it included adjustments in future statements. Learning from complaints to drive service improvements is a key objective of the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code.
  15. On 12 December 2023 the resident said to the landlord that its final response still did not explain the huge jump in costs between 2020 to 2021 and 2022 to 2023. She provided the costs and consumption for each year and questioned whether usage had been checked.
  16. Despite the resident having exhausted the landlord’s complaint process, it looked into her concerns further. It passed the figures and metre readings to its heat network team for analysis. This was reasonable and showed it was taking her concerns seriously.
  17. The team calculated the average usage had been 3,048kw per month, this was in line with expectations and comparable to other blocks of this size. It concluded it was only cost that had increased. This was in line with global energy price rises which had risen 600% in 2021 and remained elevated since.
  18. The landlord’s complaint handling policy at the time was not compliant with the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code However (the Code). It complaint target response times were higher. However, the Code became statutory in April 2024, and it is only from this date that landlords were obliged by law to follow its requirements.
  19. The landlord’s response times were more protracted than the Code requires, but they were within its policy response times. It has updated its complaint handling policy since 2024 which is now Code compliant.
  20. Overall, we find the landlord responded appropriately in its handling of the resident’s concerns about utility service charges. There were delays of almost 2 years in resolving the estimated charges. However, these were caused by the energy company’s refusal to use the meter readings and the prolonged process for securing a refund.
  21. The landlord checked and confirmed the charges were correct, energy prices globally have risen extensively during this period effecting all consumers. The costs for the landlord’s residents appeared further impacted because of the expiry of its very competitive fixed rate energy contract. It provided clear detailed responses to the resident’s concerns. It recognised and apologised for any failings and committed to making service improvements from its findings. We found no complaint handling failures in its handling of her complaint.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme there was no maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the utilities aspect of the service charge and the associated complaint.