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London Borough of Croydon (202407425)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202407425

London Borough of Croydon

10 October 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. The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of:
    1. The resident’s reports of leaks, damp and mould.
    2. The associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident holds a secure tenancy on a flat in a block owned by the local council.
  2. The resident contacted the landlord on 19 December 2022. She said she had reported damp and mould since moving into the property in April 2021. She said operatives had cancelled the job several times without explanation.
  3. The resident raised her formal complaint on 20 March 2023, saying that she had yet to identify the source causing the damp and mould; meanwhile, black mould continued to affect her health.
  4. In response, the landlord inspected the property on 23 March 2023 and booked repairs for May 2023. It issued a Stage 1 complaint response on 23 September 2023, apologising for the delays in completing the repair, which it said had now been completed.
  5. In her escalation request on 10 October 2023 and in later correspondence with the landlord, the resident said that the landlord’s responses were unprofessional. She said the landlord retiled and redecorated her bathroom but had not traced and repaired the leak.
  6. The landlord sent its final response letter on 22 May 2024. It reiterated its apology for the delay in tracing the leak, which it had since identified as originating from the external wall. This required scaffolding to be erected. It stated that it had now completed the repairs and offered the resident £900 in compensation.
  7. The resident brought her complaint to the Service on 23 May 2024. She said the leak was still ongoing, and the landlord erected scaffolding on the opposite side of the building. She told us in November 2024 that she would like the landlord to learn from the case and award her increased compensation.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident’s assertion that the landlord’s handling of this case has negatively impacted her health has been noted. It is beyond the expertise of the Service, however, to determine a causal link between the landlord’s actions (or lack thereof) and the impact on the resident’s health and well-being. These matters are better addressed by the courts, which are better equipped to determine the reason a health condition has deteriorated. Should the resident wish to pursue this matter, she may want to seek independent legal advice first.
  2. The landlord’s records write down that the leak in the resident’s property was repaired on 8 August 2024. We have completed the assessment based on the assumption that this information was accurate. If this is not correct, the resident can submit a new complaint. If left unresolved, she could bring her new complaint to the Service. 

The landlord’s response to leaks, damp and mould 

  1. When investigating a complaint, the Ombudsman applies its Dispute Resolution Principles, which include treating people fairly, following fair processes, and putting things right. The Ombudsman must first consider whether a failure on the landlord’s part has occurred and, if so, whether this adversely affected or caused detriment to the resident. If the Ombudsman found that a failure adversely affected the resident, the investigation will then consider whether the landlord has taken enough action to put it right and learn from the outcome.
  2. Under the resident’s tenancy agreement, the landlord is responsible for keeping the structure of the property in good repair.
  3. The landlord’s damp and mould policy (2023) lists the steps the landlord will take upon receiving a report of damp and mould:
    1. Step 1 – Mould wash and identify follow-up works within 6 working days. 
    2. Step 2 – Complete follow-up works (no set timeframe).
    3. Step 3 – inspection 3 months after step 1.
    4. Step 4 – inspection 6 months after step 1. Surveyor to revisit if needed.
  4. The landlord’s repairs policy says most pre-planned repair work will be carried out within 15 working days. Larger and complex repairs will be carried out within 60 working days.
  5. The resident wrote to the landlord on 19 December 2022, saying she had been reporting damp and mould in her home since April 2021. She said that the operatives scheduled the works for October 2022 and December 2022, but these were subsequently cancelled. The landlord did not dispute the resident’s version of events. Some of the correspondence on file also implied that the landlord had carried out some damp and mould repairs earlier in 2022.
  6. Following the resident’s formal complaint on 20 March 2023, the landlord inspected the property on 23 March 2023. The landlord’s surveyor found “severe damp and mould” in the bathroom and hallway, bubbling paint and water ingress from above, which was “clearly more problematic than a leaky bath seal” (what had previously been suspected as the source). The report also noted that the resident has respiratory conditions requiring the landlord to take urgent action as follows:
    1. Inspect the flat above to establish and repair the source of the leak.
    2. Hack off plaster to affected areas in the resident’s hallway and bathroom, re-plaster and re-tile.
    3. Mould wash and apply fungicidal paint to the kitchen.
  7. In its stage 1 complaint response on 23 September 2023, the landlord said that remedial works begun on 18 April 2023 had now been completed. However, nothing in the evidence confirms this. According to the evidence, between April 2023 and the date of its complaint response, the landlord raised repeated repair jobs for 11 May 2023, 6 July 2023 and 18 September 2023, when its operatives confirmed that the leak from above was still ongoing and the source had not yet been identified. The landlord’s 23 September 2023 complaint response was therefore not appropriate.  
  8. The Ombudsman expects landlords to keep comprehensive records of contacts and repairs. This is because clear, accurate, and easily accessible records create an audit trail and improve landlords’ ability to identify and address issues promptly. Aspects of the resident’s complaint were directly related to the landlord’s record keeping, which in this case did not enable the smooth delivery of services it was responsible for, as demonstrated by its incomplete repair logs and the inability to say for certain the status of repairs. For example, it was unable to say whether its operatives tracked and traced the leak on 30 November 2023, nor could it state the status of the repairs raised on 11 May 2023 and 6 July 2023.  
  9. Although tracing leaks can be challenging, this was not the cause of the delay. The delay here was due to unrelated administrative issues, which meant the contractor had only picked up the repair on 12 January 2024. It traced the leak to the external wall 20 working days later on 8 February 2024. The landlord took an additional six months to repair the leak, which was eventually fixed on 8 August 2024. This was because the scaffolding needed for the works, which it said in its May 2024 final response letter had been erected, was erected on the opposite side of the building, exposing further weaknesses in supervising its repair service, as well as oversight of its complaint team over the progress of repairs.
  10. In its final response letter, the landlord accepted ‘full responsibility’ for the prolonged delay in completing the repair for which it apologised. Where the landlord has accepted that it has made errors, it is our role to consider whether the redress it offered puts things right and resolves the resident’s complaint satisfactorily in the circumstances. In considering this, we take 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, as well as our own remedies guidance. Consideration of any aggravating factors, such as a resident’s health condition, may justify an increased award to reflect the adverse effect on the resident.
  11. In this case, the landlord’s surveyor who inspected the property in March 2023 reported that parts of the resident’s home had “severe damp and mould”. The report also noted that the resident has respiratory conditions requiring the landlord to take urgent action. In later correspondence, the resident confirmed she was diagnosed with asthma. The landlord’s records also show that it had identified the resident as vulnerable. Its contractors began work in January 2024 and traced the leak in February 2024, nearly a year after the surveyor reported that urgent action was necessary. It then took a further six months to repair the leak, which was fixed in August 2024.
  12. The landlord offered a total compensation of £900, of which £750 was for the cause of the substantive issue of the complaint and £150 for delays in handling the complaint, which will be discussed later in this assessment. In considering whether this sum was reasonable to resolve the complaint, we have relied on our remedies guidance. We have considered that the landlord identified some failings and attempted to put things right. We also considered that there were failings it had not identified. As such, we considered that its offer of £750 in compensation was insufficient to fully put things right.
  13. Based on our remedies guidance, we think that an additional sum of £150 would be fair and proportionate to resolve the complaint. This sum takes into account the vulnerabilities of the resident, which we do not believe the landlord took seriously enough, as seen from the length of the delay. In our view, the award it subsequently made was low, given that damp and mould would have had a more severe effect on her compared to other residents in the same position without her vulnerabilities. Accordingly, an order has been made below for the landlord to increase the level of compensation.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint

  1. The resident raised her formal complaint on 20 March 2023. The landlord’s complaint policy (2023) states that the target for responding to stage 1 complaints was 20 working days. The landlord responded 128 working days later on 23 September 2023.
  2. However, the landlord failed to recognise that the resident’s email of 19 December 2022 was also an expression of dissatisfaction. She said that operatives had cancelled the scheduled repairs 3 times without notice or communication, which she described as ‘unacceptable’. This adds an additional 63 working days to the delay in responding to the resident’s complaint, bringing the total to 191 working days in stage 1.
  3. The resident escalated her complaint on 10 October 2023. Against a target of 20 working days, the landlord responded 157 working days later on 22 May 2024. It has therefore taken the resident a total of 348 working days to progress her complaint through the landlord’s internal complaint process, which was inappropriate. There is no evidence that the landlord kept the resident up to date about these delays. 
  4. Both complaint responses said the repairs had now been completed. There is no evidence that this was in accordance with the information available to the landlord at the time of responding to the resident’s complaint. This undermined the resident’s trust in the landlord’s internal complaint process.
  5. In recognition of the delayed response, the landlord offered £150 in compensation. This was insufficient to put things right, given the significant delay in the landlord’s internal process, which prevented the resident from bringing her complaint to the Service for a resolution. We therefore made a further order of £50 in compensation.  
  6. Finally, there is no evidence that the landlord identified meaningful learning from its complaint handling or provided any details of what it would do differently to avoid repeating similar errors. We therefore recommend that the landlord provide refresher training to its complaint-handling staff.    

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of leaks, damp and mould.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was a service failure in the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. In recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused by the failings identified in this report, the landlord is ordered to pay the resident’s bank account by 7 November 2025, £1,100 in compensation, comprising:
    1. £900 for the distress caused by its handling of the damp and mould, inclusive of the £750 already offered in its complaint response.
    2. £200 for its complaint handling, inclusive of the £150 already offered in its complaint response.
  2. The landlord must apologise in writing to the resident for the failures identified in this report. The landlord must ensure:  
    1. The apology is provided by 7 November 2025.  ​ 
    2. The apology is specific to the failures identified in this decision, meaningful and empathetic. 
    3. It has due regard to our apologies guidance.
  3. Evidence of compliance must be sent to the Service by the due dates specified.

Recommendation

  1. The landlord should provide refresher training for its complaints staff about the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code. Training is available at our centre for learning.