Great Places Housing Association (202423526)

Background

1. The resident lives in a 3-bedroom semi-detached house, her tenancy began on 12 June 2023.
2. The resident experienced issues with her boiler which she complained to the landlord about in December 2023. She then experienced further issues and raised a subsequent complaint in April 2024.

What the complaint is about

3. The complaint is about:
   1. The landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of repair to her boiler.
   2. How the landlord responded to the resident’s complaint.

Our decision (determination)

4. We have found that:
   1. There was service failure by the landlord in its response to the resident’s reports of repair to her boiler.
   2. There was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s complaint.

Summary of reasons

5. The landlord appropriately acknowledged its service failure within its complaint process; it apologised and offered a reasonable amount of redress. It failed however to keep adequate records or demonstrate any learning from its identified service failures.
6. The landlord responded to the resident’s complaint in line with its policy and procedure but failed to provide a full response which addressed all points of the resident’s complaint.

Putting things right

Where we find service failure, maladministration or severe maladministration we can make orders for the landlord to put things right. We have the discretion to make recommendations in all other cases within our jurisdiction.

Orders

Landlords must comply with our orders in the manner and timescales we specify. The landlord must provide documentary evidence of compliance with our orders by the due date set.

Recommendations

Our recommendations are not binding, and a landlord may decide not to follow them.

Our investigation

The complaint procedure

What we found and why

The circumstances of this complaint are well known by the parties involved, so it is not necessary to detail everything that’s happened or comment on all the information we’ve reviewed. We’ve only included the key information that forms the basis of our decision of whether the landlord is responsible for maladministration.

7. The resident in communications with the Ombudsman provided details of previous issues raised to the landlord about the boiler. The landlord also provided a stage 1 response dated 9 January 2024. No evidence has been seen to indicate this complaint was escalated to stage 2 of the landlord’s complaint process; therefore, this will not form part of this investigation. For clarity this investigation will focus upon the repair reported on 15 April 2024 and the landlord’s response to the resident’s complaint.
8. The landlord’s repairs policy says it will visit and make safe within 24 hours if a repair is classed as an emergency. Loss of heating or hot water for elderly or vulnerable tenants is an example of an emergency repair according to its policy. This policy also confirms that the resident is responsible for damage to contents and strongly recommends residents to take out contents insurance.
9. In this case, the resident reported having no heating or hot water due to a boiler leak on 15 April 2024. The landlord’s notes indicate it had been leaking “all weekend”. Although an emergency job was appropriately raised on 15 April 2024, it was cancelled by the contractor. 2 further jobs were raised and cancelled by the contractor. This caused an avoidable period of delay in which the resident remained without heating or hot water. Although the repair records indicate the reason for the jobs being cancelled, the landlord failed to acknowledge this within its complaint responses, which was not appropriate. It failed to demonstrate that it investigated the reasons the job kept being cancelled by its contractor and what process should have followed.
10. In both its complaint responses, the landlord confirmed its contractor attended on 19 April 2024 and noted a part was required. Its repair records do not contain detail to support this claim. Its repair records note that its contractor attended on 23 April 2024, a part was required and the repair completed on 24 April 2024. In total it took 9 days for the repair to be completed, it is not clear from the landlords records what advice, if any, was provided to the resident during this time, or if the landlord considered the individual household needs. Although it is noted at this time of the year temporary heaters may have not been required, the landlord should still hold a record of its discussions with the resident. It is also not clear if it confirmed appointments with the resident as per its own policy.
11. Part of the resident’s complaint was about an operatives conduct. It is clear from the landlord’s records that this was not the first time the resident had experienced or reported this. It would have therefore been reasonable for the landlord to consider carrying out its own investigations with its contractor. If it had done so, it would have been able to reach an informed decision based on its findings and provided a full response to the resident’s complaint. Rather it advised it had asked its contractor to carry out its own investigation and advised it was not “privy” to the outcome due to GDPR.
12. In escalating her complaint, the resident sought more compensation, the landlord offered £100 for its service failure. Its remedies and resolution policy says it could consider amounts up to £150 for service failures that included short delays in receiving a service. Its offer of redress was also in line with the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies for distress and inconvenience when there has been a delay in getting matters resolved. In the Ombudsman’s opinion, this amount of financial redress offered by the landlord was reasonable.
13. Where there are failings by a landlord, the Ombudsman’s role is to consider whether the redress offered has put things right and resolved the resident’s complaint satisfactorily in the circumstances. In considering this, the Ombudsman takes into account whether the landlord’s offer of redress was in line with our Dispute Resolution Principles: be fair, put things right, and learn from outcomes.
14. This Service has sympathy with the resident that the period for which the repairs were required was a difficult time, however there is no evidence the length of time the works took equate to maladministration on the part of the landlord or were excessively unreasonable. It was appropriate that the landlord acknowledged the service failure of its contractor. It offered an apology, some compensation, and it recognised the extent of inconvenience caused in resolving the issue.
15. There is no indication however, in the landlord’s response that it had taken any learning from its failings or put any measures in place to address the shortcomings that had been highlighted by the resident’s complaint. The landlord failed to investigate the avoidable delay in the contractor attending the property, suggesting a lack of oversight over its contractor’s performance. It is for this reason that a finding of service failure is made.

16. The landlord operates a 2 stage complaints process, its policy says it will acknowledge complaints at both stages within 5 working days. It will respond at stage 1 within 10 working days and 20 working days at stage 2.
17. It is noted that apart from a slight delay in acting upon the resident’s request to escalate her complaint, the landlord’s complaint responses were timely and within its policy guidelines.
18. The landlord responded to the resident’s complaint at stage 1 and focused solely on the repair to the boiler reported on 15 April 2024. Within its records, it notes a call was made to the resident to discuss her complaint on 24 April 2024, the landlord detailed historic boiler issues raised by the resident which resulted in the resident using a hotel at cost. The landlord also noted the resident had indicated that she had lost her job and the operative who attended had attended before and caused distress. The landlord failed to acknowledge these aspects of the resident’s complaint which was not reasonable. The complaint handling code expects landlords to address all points raised in complaints. The landlord failed to do this in this case.
19. Internal communications about the repair also note that it was an “open complaint” due to ongoing boiler issues. This was before the resident made her complaint on 23 April 2024. This indicates a potential record keeping or complaint handling issue but is a failure by the landlord as noted above, it did not investigate the historic issues raised.
20. Taking the above into account a finding of service failure is made.

Learning

21. The landlord did not demonstrate any learning from its identified service failures throughout its complaint investigation. It did not address all aspects of the resident’s complaint. The landlord should ensure its monitoring of complaint responses and commitments made in complaint responses is efficient.