Clarion Housing Association Limited (202335065)

Decision
Case ID	202335065
Decision type	Investigation
Landlord	Clarion Housing Association Limited
Landlord type	Housing Association
Occupancy	Leaseholder
Date	27 November 2025

Background

1. The resident complained that he is paying a higher level of service charge than multiple neighbours, even though the neighbours have either the same size property or a bigger property than his. He wants an explanation about how service charges are apportioned in his block.

What the complaint is about

2. The resident’s complaint is about the landlord’s:
   1. Response to the resident’s concerns about having higher service charges than his neighbours.
   2. Handling of his complaint.

Our decision (determination)

3. There was no maladministration found in the landlord’s:
   1. Response to the resident’s concerns about having higher service charges than his neighbours.
   2. Handling of his complaint.

We have not made orders for the landlord to put things right.

Summary of reasons

4. The landlord gave reasonable and timely explanations of why the resident’s charges may be different to those of other residents.
5. The landlord followed the timeframes for its interim complaint policy and provided compensation payments even though its responses were within policy timescale.

 

 

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.

Recommendations

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

Our recommendations
We recommend the landlord show the resident how his apportionment arrangement, as per his lease, was applied to the overall costs and therefore how his total was calculated. The landlord should pull out the relevant information about how the resident’s specific charge was calculated and share it with him.

 

Our investigation

The complaint procedure

Date	What happened
24 October 2023	The resident complained about the service charge. He said one neighbour with the same size flat and one neighbour with a larger flat both paid less service charges than him. He added he had received a letter explaining the charges but was dissatisfied with the explanation.
9 November 2023	The landlord issued its stage 1 complaint response. It said: It sent a letter in October 2023 explaining reasons why the resident’s service charges may differ from neighbours. It could not discuss other resident’s service charges due to General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR). It confirmed there had been no overcharge, so no refund was due. It awarded £50 compensation payment for delays in responding to queries.
10 November 2023	The resident escalated his complaint as he said his original complaint was not answered.
2 January 2024	The landlord issued the stage 2 response. It repeated the stage 1 response and added the following points: Service charges are apportioned equally between the number of units that have benefitted from that service. How a property is recharged depends on the agreement with the landlord. The landlord offered an additional £50 compensation payment for delays in responding to the complaint.
Referral to the Ombudsman	The resident contacted the Ombudsman on 9 January 2024 and said he wanted clarity about why another resident with an identical property to his is paying less.

 

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.

 

Complaint	The landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about having higher service charges than his neighbours.
Finding	No maladministration

6. The landlord did not provide evidence of the resident’s initial query about the service charges. However, it acknowledged the resident’s enquiry about the service charges on 26 September 2023 and responded on 20 October 2023. In its response, the landlord said:
   1. It offers a number of different tenancy and lease types.
   2. If the resident’s home had a higher apportionment value than his neighbours, he may pay proportionally more for the services the landlord provided to his home.
   3. The apportionment value could be worked out using different methods including:
      1. The number of homes in the block, scheme or estate.
      2. The number of bedrooms in the home
      3. The size of the home.
      4. The services that a property benefited from and the number of properties on the block. For example, one block would split services between 4 properties and another between 20 properties.

This was considered a reasonable response, as the landlord was unable to provide specific details about other accounts. It explained there were several factors that go into determining service charges.

7. Through its complaint responses, the landlord gave further information about how it had calculated the charges, how it had apportioned them and confirmed the charges were correct. The explanations were reasonable, though the resident remained dissatisfied as the landlord was unable to give specific reasons for the different rates between him and his neighbours. However, it was reasonable that the landlord said it could not respond about the charges to specific neighbours due to GDPR.
8. The landlord responded to the resident’s concerns multiple times. It explained that GDPR limited the detail it could provide but confirmed that different resident’s had different lease agreements and the included apportionment approach was part of how the service charges were calculated. The landlord referred the resident to check his lease for further information. This was a missed opportunity, as the landlord could have pulled out the relevant information on how his specific charge was calculated and shared it with him as part of its response. The landlord also could have shown the resident how his apportionment arrangement, as per his lease, was applied to the overall costs and therefore how his total was calculated. Although this was a missed opportunity, the investigation found no evidence of maladministration.

 

 

Complaint	The handling of his complaint.
Finding	No maladministration

9. The landlord provided the Ombudsman its interim complaints policy, effective from 17 June 2022 until April 2024. The policy stated the landlord aimed to log and acknowledge complaints received after this date at both stage 1 and 2 within 10 working days of receipt. The policy also stated it would respond to complaints within 20 working days of logging the complaint at stage 1 and within 40 working days for complaints at stage 2. The Ombudsman used these standards to assess the landlord’s complaint handling.
10. The resident contacted the landlord about the service charge issues in September 2023. This was acknowledged on 26 September 2023, and a response was provided on 20 October 2023. The resident then raised his complaint on 24 October 2023. The landlord acknowledged it on 31 October 2023, which met the interim complaints policy timescale for acknowledgement. It responded on 9 November 2023, 13 working days later, which also met the policy timeframe. However, because the landlord used different timescales, it recognised the resident’s communications in September as a complaint. In the stage 1 response, it then acknowledged delays in responding and awarded a compensation payment of £50 to the resident.
11. The resident requested the complaint escalation to stage 2 on 10 November 2023. This was acknowledged on the same day, and the landlord provided the stage 2 response on 2 January 2024. This was 35 working days which was within the landlord’s interim complaints policy timeframe. However, the landlord acknowledged delays in providing a response to the complaint and awarded a further consolatory payment of £50.
12. Although the landlord identified that it had taken longer than usual to offer the resident responses, and made awards of compensation to recognise this, it did act in line with its published interim policy and therefore we haven’t considered the same delay to be a failing.

 

Learning

13. The landlord failed to send the resident’s initial contact to us when requested. In future it should ensure it sends all relevant information to the Ombudsman at the first request.