We are updating our systems this weekend. You will be unable to submit an online complaint form from Friday 3 April until Monday 6 April.

Normal services will resume on Tuesday 7 April.

Thank you for your patience.

A2Dominion Housing Group Limited (202304405)

Back to Top

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202304405

A2Dominion Housing Group Limited

5 November 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 reports about drain blockages and smells.

Background

  1. The resident was a shared owner of the property.
  2. The property is on the ground-floor.
  3. The resident contacted the landlord on 24 April 2023 to inform it that the communal drains had become blocked and required a jet wash. The landlord attended on 25 April 2023, checking the manholes in front of the property and performing an upstream high powered jet wash to clear the drains. The resident reported further issues on 4 May 2023. She said that there was a loud gurgling sound whenever her toilet was flushed, and that bad smells were emanating from her bathroom whenever another property used their toilet. The landlord attended on the same day to clear the blocked stack and to drain the outlets. It said that, following this, it tested the facilities and found all to be free flowing.
  4. The resident raised a complaint to the landlord on 5 May 2023. She said the issue with the drain had been ongoing for 2 weeks and filled her flat with the smell of sewage. She said she had been reporting this to the landlord and that it failed to attend appointments. The landlord provided its stage 1 complaint response on 15 May 2023 upholding the resident’s complaint for its failure to resolve the ongoing smell. It provided £230 compensation. This consisted of £100 for distress and inconvenience, £80 for the time this had taken and £50 for poor communication. It said that its drainage contractor had recommended it undertake a more extensive investigation and that this was due to be completed by 26 June 2023.
  5. The landlord’s contractors attended to perform a closed-circuit television survey (CCTV) on 8 June 2023 and, according to its records, found no issues within the drainage system. The resident then contacted the landlord to escalate her complaint on 12 June 2023. She said that the contractor had confirmed to her that limescale was the cause of the problem following the CCTV survey, but she had heard nothing further from the landlord about how it intended to resolve the ongoing problem. She said this had now been ongoing for 52 days.
  6. The landlord sent contractors out again on 29 June 2023 who used a high-powered jet wash to clear a blockage in the system. The landlord also performed another full survey of the system on 10 July 2023. This recommended that anti-vacuum traps be installed on the bath, basin and kitchen sink in the resident’s property to prevent smells.
  7. The landlord provided its stage 2 complaint response on 12 July 2023, once again upholding the resident’s complaint. It increased its compensation offer to £280, adding an additional £50 compensation for communication failures. The landlord said that as the resident was a shared owner, it would be unable to carry out works within her property but recommended that she get her internal drains and stack checked by her own plumber as the next step.
  8. The resident contacted the Ombudsman on 13 July 2023, asking us to consider her complaint. She said that she was unhappy with the landlord’s communication throughout her problems, and that she felt it had never fulfilled the contractor’s recommended actions of jet washing the stack from the top floor to remove the limescale build up. She was also unhappy with the landlord’s assertion that she needed to resolve the problem given her water was not backing up, meaning she believed the communal pipes were the cause of the problem. She said she wanted the landlord to take responsibility for maintaining the drains correctly and for an explanation of how it intends to improve its communication with residents.

Assessment and findings

The scope of this investigation

  1. The resident has recently advised this Service that the landlord took actions to resolve drain blockages and smells during 2024. As per paragraph 42a of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, we are only able to consider matters that have exhausted a landlord’s complaints process. The landlord’s final complaint response was issued in July 2023, at which point it concluded that the drain blockage issue fell within the resident’s repair obligations. However, the Ombudsman is unable to assess the landlord’s handling of the repairs since July 2023 or determine whether it was reasonable that new information that became available since then should have prompted it to reverse its decision on responsibility for the repair.

The landlord’s handling of reports about drain blockages and smells

  1. The resident’s lease states that it is the landlord’s responsibility to maintain, repair and improve ‘the service installations (except such as serve exclusively a unit and except such as belong to any public utility or supply authority)’. This means that resident is responsible for the pipes within, and exclusively for, her own property.
  2. The landlord’s repair policy states that it will attend emergency repairs to make these safe within 4 hours and completed any necessary repairs within 24 hours. It says for standard repairs it will complete these within 20 working days.
  3. The landlord’s response to the resident’s reports was broadly reasonable. It attended on a total of 5 occasions. The landlord initially attended to perform a high-powered jet wash on 24 April 2023 and 4 May 2023. In both of these instances, the landlord attended within a reasonable timeframe of the resident’s reports.
  4. The notes left by contractors following the appointments on 24 April 2023 and 4 May 2023 both say that they had cleared blockages and that they had left the water free flowing. Neither of these reports mentioned anything about follow-on works and subsequently the landlord closed the jobs. Given the lack of evidence about the need for any other action from the landlord it was reasonable from it to have closed these.
  5. Following a third report made by the resident, the landlord employed specialists to perform a CCTV survey. The CCTV survey said that it found no faults in the system, thereby not recommending any additional works for the landlord to raise or undertake. The landlord once again closed the job following this. It was reasonable that the landlord closed the job at this point given there was no evidence that established that there were any further repairs needed.
  6. Following the CCTV survey, the resident made further reports about smells. The landlord returned to clean the drains again on 29 June 2023. Following this, there were again no recommendations made by the contractors for any follow-on works and the notes say it cleared a blockage. When the problems continued, the landlord raised another inspection. This inspection recommended that the resident fit anti-vacuum traps in her property. In the landlord’s stage 2 complaint response, it provided her with this advice.
  7. The resident has mentioned that she was unhappy the landlord continued to close jobs when the smells carried on. Whilst the landlord could have done more to communicate with the resident following these appointments, contractors did not make the landlord aware of the need for any follow-up appointments or that issues remained. Nevertheless, it would have been good practice, given the resident had raised the matter on multiple occasions, for the landlord to follow up with the resident and check that she was satisfied with the resolution.
  8. The Ombudsman would expect that the landlord employs specialist contractors if regular operatives are not able to resolve an ongoing issue. The Ombudsman also expects that the landlord will act on their advice. In this instance, the surveys found no follow-on works or structural issues with the pipework. It was reasonable for the landlord to rely on this advice and to advise the resident of the recommendations made during the inspections.
  9. The resident reported to the landlord on several occasions that contractors had told her that the cause of the smells was a build up of limescale at the top of the stack. The Ombudsman has not seen any evidence of contractors feeding this back to the landlord, nor making any recommendations about this. Nevertheless, the landlord’s inspection on 10 July 2023 considered this as a cause of the issue. The inspection report does not make any mention of limescale at the top of the stack. It is unclear from this report if the landlord did check for limescale, although it is noted that this was listed as something to be checked on the work order. The lack of clarity on what it inspected was a shortcoming in the landlord’s investigation.
  10. The recommendations of this inspection were that the resident should have her internal pipework checked and install anti-vacuum traps in her property. As this would fall under her repair responsibility as per the lease, the landlord informed the resident as part of its stage 2 complaint response that she would need to have this work completed by her own plumber. The landlord’s contractor recommended this following its inspection. Therefore, it was reasonable that it put this to the resident as the next step in trying to resolve the ongoing smells and blockages.
  11. The landlord recognised that there had been delays in its responses to the resident’s reports. In particular, there were delays in arranging the CCTV survey of the pipework. It also apologised for its communication and for closing jobs before checking with the resident that it had resolved all of the issues she had reported. For its failings, it offered the resident a total of £280 compensation. Given the landlord’s actions, including 2 separate inspection and 3 appointments, this represented a reasonable offer of compensation for any shortcomings. This amount was within a range that the Ombudsman’s Remedies Guidance would recommend where there were failures that adversely affected a resident.
  12. Whilst the landlord was not able to resolve the issue by the close of its stage 2 complaint response, it took the actions that the Ombudsman would expect given the circumstances. It attempted repairs, sought specialist advice, and undertook 2 separate inspections. The specialists did not make the landlord aware of any necessary follow-on works and it therefore closed the jobs. Whilst it could have performed the survey earlier and communicated better with the resident, the landlord’s offer of compensation was fair for the distress and inconvenience its failings caused her.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53b of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was reasonable redress in the landlord’s handling of reports about drain blockages and smells.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord should reoffer the resident its compensation offer of £280 made in its stage 2 complaint response. The finding of reasonable redress is based upon the offer of compensation being paid to the resident.