Notting Hill Genesis (202526586)

Background

1. During June 2025 the resident emailed the landlord to raise concerns about its general approach to complaint handling.

What the complaint is about

2. The complaint is about the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about its handling of his complaints.

Our decision (determination)

3. There was maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about its handling of his complaints.

We have made orders for the landlord to put things right.

Reasons

4. The landlord’s complaints policy says it will contact residents to acknowledge their complaint and will discuss the outcome they’re seeking. It also says it will respond to stage 1 complaints within 10 working days and to stage 2 complaints within 20 working days. If it needs more time at either stage it will agree a new timescale with the resident, and this will not usually exceed a further 10 days.
5. On 5 June 2025 the resident emailed the landlord to raise concerns about its handling of his complaints. He said there had been delayed responses, complaints closed without meaningful resolution, and failure to raise formal complaints in a timely manner. He also complained about the unprofessional conduct of staff during phone calls.
6. The resident’s complaint listed 9 complaint references from December 2024 to the current complaint. He set out the date the complaint was made and the number of days that had passed.He did not specify what aspects he was dissatisfied with in relation to each complaint. There’s no evidence that the landlord contacted the resident to discuss this further. Therefore, it failed to respond in line with its policy and missed an opportunity to ensure it fully understood the resident’s complaint.
7. The landlord’s stage 1 complaint response of 10 July 2025 set out its response dates for each of the complaint references. It identified where its response was delayed and what redress had been provided. It said that where it needed more time, it was not required to agree the extension with the resident but update him, which it did. This was not in line with its complaints policy which says it will agree extensions with residents.
8. The landlord’s response acknowledged that the resident had requested calls by prior arrangement. It asked to discuss the allegations of staff conduct with him. It’s unclear why it had not arranged to do so as part of its complaint investigation. That it did not, meant it was unable to provide a response to this aspect of the complaint which was inappropriate.
9. The response itself was provided 24 working days after the complaint was made. There’s no evidence that the landlord contacted the resident about an extension. It failed to acknowledge the delay and failed to offer any redress. This compounded the resident’s existing concerns about the complaints process and further eroded the landlord/tenant relationship.
10. On 10 July 2025 the resident emailed the landlord to set out his dissatisfaction with its response, which he noted was late. On 23 July 2025 it wrote to him to acknowledge the complaint and said it would respond by 20 August 2025. This was significantly over its target of 2 working days to acknowledge complaints. On 19 August 2025 the landlord advised the resident that it had extended the deadline to 18 September 2025. There’s no evidence that it contacted the resident to agree the extension in line with its policy. Furthermore, the new deadline was 49 working days after the complaint was made, and therefore outside its target of 30 working days.
11. On 18 September 2025 the resident responded to the landlord’s email of 12 September 2025 to arrange a phone call to discuss the stage 2 complaint. There is no evidence that the landlord responded. Its stage 2 complaint response of 18 September 2025 said it did not receive a response to its email, and therefore was unable to go through the complaint with the resident. This was incorrect. Its response acknowledged both its failure to contact the resident about the delay at stage 1 and its delay at stage 2. However, it inappropriately decided not to uphold the complaint and did not consider offering compensation to put things right.
12. The resident has provided a longer list of complaint references to us and has asked us to investigate systemic issues with the landlord’s complaint handling. The purpose of our investigation is to assess the landlord’s response to the specific issues raised by the resident during the complaint. Therefore, we cannot consider these new and/or wider issues during this investigation. Our duty to monitor team is currently working with the landlord on its complaints policy, including timescales. We expect the landlord to embed these changes into its complaint handling practices to improve its service to residents.
13. Our compensation guidance says that payments of up to £100 should be made where there was a complaint handling failure which adversely affected the resident but did not have a permanent impact. In ordering £100 compensation, we have considered the distress and inconvenience caused to the resident by the landlord’s complaint handling failures.

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.

Orders

Landlords must comply with our orders in the manner and timescales we specify. The landlord must provide documentary evidence of compliance with our orders by the due date set.