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Gentoo Group Limited (202231509)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202231509

Gentoo Group Limited

2 December 2024


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. This complaint is about the landlord’s handling of:
    1. The resident’s request for it to complete a pathway repair.
    2. The associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident held an assured tenancy. He completed a right to buy purchase of the property in February 2023.
  2. At the time of the complaint there was an 85-year-old resident of the property who suffered from dementia.
  3. The landlord completed a repair to make safe the path around a manhole cover at the side of the property on 21 June 2022. The resident submitted a right to buy application which the landlord acknowledged on 16 August 2022.
  4. The resident contacted the landlord to raise a complaint on 21 January 2023. He reported that, due to the landlord’s shoddy workmanship, the path had cracked again causing a trip hazard. The resident completed his purchase of the property on 27 February 2023.
  5. The landlord provided its stage 1 complaint response on 2 March 2023. It did not uphold the resident’s complaint. It said it would not have completed the repair whilst the right to buy was ongoing, and that it provided this information in its acknowledgement letter when it received his application. It said that, given the timescales involved, it did not have enough time to go through the process to grant the resident permission to complete the repair before the sale completed.
  6. The resident escalated his complaint to stage 2 on 8 March 2023. He said the landlord’s inaction had left the path unsafe whilst a vulnerable person was living in the property. He added that there had been no response about why the landlord had not completed the repair correctly initially. The landlord provided its stage 2 complaint response on 2 May 2023. It said that it reviewed the photographs and report from its initial repair and found it had left the path in a satisfactory condition and free from significant hazards. It again did not uphold the resident’s complaint.
  7. The resident wrote to the Ombudsman on 22 June 2023 asking us to consider his complaint. He said he was unhappy about the ‘limbo’ status as the landlord neither repaired the path, nor gave him the permission to complete the repairs. He felt it was still the landlord’s responsibility to make safe the property, especially considering there was an elderly lady with dementia living there at the time. To resolve his complaint, the resident said he would like the landlord to undertake path repairs where its poor workmanship led to new problems.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for it to complete a pathway repair

  1. The landlord’s position on repairs whilst a right to buy is ongoing is that once it receives an application, it is ‘only obliged to carry out statutory repairs to the property to keep it, amongst other things, wind and watertight’.
  2. Under these terms, the landlord decided not to carry out the path repair that the resident raised in January 2023 following his right to buy application. The landlord said this decision was based on its statutory obligations under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985.
  3. The landlord’s decision to adopt this stance was appropriate and in line with the approach taken by landlord as part of the right to buy scheme. There is no evidence that the landlord was obliged to conduct the path repair when the resident raised it after the right to buy application. This is partly because the right to buy valuation is based on the property condition at that point and any improvements or repairs after that date could affect this.
  4. The landlord’s acknowledgement letter sent following the resident’s application on 16 August 2022 outlined this position and clearly explained that a repair, such as the one to the pathway, would not be done whilst the right to buy process was ongoing.
  5. The resident has stated that he felt the landlord’s failure to properly complete the repair in June 2022 led to the re-emergence of the cracks in the path. In particular he queried why the landlord had poured quick drying cement in the cracks rather than lifting and re-bedding the paving as a whole. The Ombudsman’s role in this situation is not to determine what would have been the preferred repair for the landlord to undertake, but to determine how the landlord investigated the resident’s concerns.
  6. The landlord has failed to provide evidence that it contacted the resident promptly in response to his reports. There is no record of contact between the resident reporting the new concerns about the path on 24 January 2023 and the landlord’s stage 1 complaint response on 2 March 2023. Nevertheless, the resident has told this Service that the landlord verbally told him it would not complete the repair. The landlord’s submission to the Ombudsman also mentions it verbally provided this information, although it has not provided evidence or the date of this call. However, both the resident and landlord agree that the latter did communicate with the former during January-February 2023.
  7. The landlord should ensure that moving forward it retains complete records of contact with residents, including call notes and any risk assessments it undertakes. It would also be good practice to provide residents with written responses to requests of this nature which would allow it to provide a full audit trail of the actions it took. A recommendation is made below regarding this.
  8. The resident advises that he requested the right to complete the repair himself but that this was denied by the landlord. The landlord’s subsequent explanation for this (made in its stage 1 complaint response) was that it would not have had the time to go through its permissions process before the sale completed. The resident completed the purchase 34 days after reporting the repair. As outlined above, once the resident completed the purchase, the repair would fall under his responsibility.
  9. Whilst the landlord may not have been obliged to complete the path repair, it is unclear how it assessed if there was a health and safety risk which would have made it a statutory obligation. In this instance, it should have considered if the path represented a hazard, particularly given there was a vulnerable resident in the property. It would be best practice if the landlord performed a full written risk assessment of such requests – a recommendation is made below regarding this.
  10. Nevertheless, given the timescales involved and the short amount of time between the path repair report and the property purchase, it is unlikely that the landlord’s actions caused any significant delay in the resident being able to complete the works. The likely distress and inconvenience caused to the resident would also have been minimal given the narrow period of time involved. The Ombudsman is unable to say if the landlord would have given the resident permission to complete these repairs had the time been available but the adverse affect was limited.
  11. When investigating his complaint, the landlord reviewed the original work order, as well as the post-repair photographs that the contractor provided. Having reviewed these, it found that the work completed in June 2022 was satisfactory and it had left the path free from significant hazards. It was fair for the landlord to review this evidence and the position it outlined in its complaint responses was based on the evidence available to it.
  12. Overall, there was no maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for it to complete the path repair. There was no obligation on it to complete the repair after the right to buy application was made. There were shortcomings in the absence of written communications and a risk assessment of the repair, but these were over a short period and the likely outcome would not have been different. Whilst its communication with the resident could have been clearer between January-March 2023, it had previously set out its position on repair obligations to him when he first applied for the right to buy.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint

  1. The landlord’s complaint policy has 2 stages. At stage 1 of the complaints process it says it will acknowledge complaints within 5 working days and aim to provide its complaint response within 10 working days of this. At stage 2 of the complaints process it says it will again acknowledge the complaints within 5 working days and aim to provide its complaint response within a further 20 working days. The landlord’s policy also says that there may be circumstances where it is unable to provide a response within these timescales, but that it will inform residents if this is the case.
  2. The landlord failed to provide its complaint response within the timescales specified at stage 1 of the complaints procedure. It has not provided any evidence to the Ombudsman that it acknowledged his complaints and it took 27 working days to issue the response.
  3. At stage 2, the landlord again failed to provide its complaint response within the timescales specified. Whilst there was a complaint acknowledgement sent by the landlord in this case, it nonetheless took 37 working days from the complaint being escalated for it to provide its stage 2 complaint response. The landlord did explain that this was partially due to the escalation request ending up in a spam e-mail inbox. Nonetheless, this was the landlord’s responsibility and represented a service failure.
  4. The landlord did not provide the resident with updates about his complaint. It should have written to him at both stages 1 and 2 to explain any delays and to provide a new timescale for responding.
  5. Overall, the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint represented service failure. It failed to keep to the relevant timescales at stage 1 and stage 2 of the complaints process and did not keep the resident informed about any delays. Given this, the landlord should pay the resident £50 compensation. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance which recommends a figure in this range where there has been a minor failure by a landlord over a short duration.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for it to complete a pathway repair.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. It is ordered that within 6 weeks of the date of this letter, the landlord:
    1. Pays the resident £50 compensation for the inconvenience caused to him by its failures when handling his complaint.
    2. Apologises in writing to the resident.
    3. Provides evidence to the Ombudsman that it has done so.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord should consider adding information to its repairs policy about repair responsibilities whilst a right to buy is ongoing.
  2. The landlord should review its record-keeping processes to ensure that it is able to provide the Ombudsman with any necessary records in relation to phone calls or other forms of contact with residents.
  3. The landlord should consider undertaking formal risk assessments of any requests for repairs made whilst the right to buy process is ongoing.