Abri Group Limited (202347132)

Background

1. The resident is disabled and lives in a block of flats. A third-party private company is the managing agent and own the freehold of the property. The landlord holds a headlease with the freeholder and an underlease with the resident. The resident complained to the landlord about the loss of water for 3 days.

What the complaint is about

2. The complaint is about the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about a burst water pipe.

Our decision (determination)

3. There has been no maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about a burst water pipe.

Reasons

What we have not looked at

4. The managing agent responsible for completing repairs to the water supply is not a member of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme. In accordance with the scheme, we can only investigate complaints about members of our Scheme. Our investigation has focussed solely on the landlord’s actions or omissions.

What we have looked at

5. The resident’s lease requires the landlord to ensure the managing agent complies with its contractual obligations. In this case, the landlord is responsible for ensuring the managing agent responded to and repaired the burst water pipe.
6. The managing agent instructed a plumber to fix the burst pipe on 15 September 2023. The plumber required a part that would not arrive until 18 September 2023. The nearby managing agent’s office was open 24 hours a day to allow residents to take water back to their property. Water was turned on for 3 hours on both days to allow resident’s access to water over the weekend. The pipe was repaired on 18 September 2023.
7. On 18 September 2023, the resident complained that she did not have access to the tap water over the weekend. She said she felt “humiliated” as she could not access the water from the managing agent’s office. She bought water from the supermarket instead, which she said was inconvenient for her.
8. The landlord did not uphold the resident’s complaint at stage 1 or stage 2 of its process. Within its responses, it explained that it was not responsible for carrying out the relevant repairs. This is correct and in line with the terms of the occupancy agreement.
9. The landlord’s responsibility was to ensure that the managing agent had acted appropriately. Given the evidence provided by both the managing agent and the resident, it concluded that the managing agent had taken reasonable steps to ensure that the resident had access to water over the period of the weekend when the landlord was not available. This was a fair approach.
10. Whilst we understand the lack of water would have been inconvenient for the resident. There is no maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about a burst water pipe. This is because the landlord was not available over the weekend when the water pipe burst, but the managing agent had already put measures in place to mitigate the risk. When the landlord returned after the weekend the water pipe had been fixed. The landlord’s actions under the circumstances were fair and we are satisfied that it has acted reasonably.