London Borough of Islington (202505120)

Background

1. The resident experienced a water leak into his property caused by blocked gutters in 2022. He was concerned that the landlord had not cleared the gutters and the problem with water leaks could reoccur.

What the complaint is about

2. The complaint is about the landlord’s response to:
   1. Clearing the guttering.
   2. The resident’s complaint.

Our decision (determination)

3. We found that:
   1. There was maladministration in the landlord’s response to clearing the guttering.
   2. There was no maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s complaint.

We have made an order for the landlord to put things right.

Summary of reasons

Clearing the guttering

4. There were delays in completing the work as repeated attempts were needed due to the most affected part of the guttering not being cleared in previous jobs. The work orders were not completed in line with the timescales that had been allocated. The landlord did not pursue the access issues with the neighbour in a timely manner.

Complaint handling

5. The landlord responded to the resident’s complaint in line with its complaints and feedback policy and our Complaint Handling Code (the Code).

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.

Recommendations

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

Our investigation

The complaint procedure

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.

6. The landlord’s stage 1 response said that it could not find a repair request reported in 2022. However, the evidence showed that the matter was reported on 5 September 2022. A job was logged as a routine responsive repair to be completed in 20 working days. This timescale was in line with the landlord’s housing repairs guidance that was in place at the time.
7. Initially, one operative was allocated to the job. The operative attended the property on 16 September 2022. However, he could not complete the work alone due to the height of where the guttering was. A new job was raised for two operatives to attend. The job was logged again as a routine responsive repair to be completed in 20 working days, in line with the landlord’s housing repairs guidance.
8. The work order recorded the job as having ended on 21 December 2022. This considerably exceeded the 20 working days timescale allocated to complete the job. The operative reported that the problem had been caused by “negligence” of not keeping the gutters clean.
9. Another work order to clear the guttering was raised on 24 June 2024. A work order to put up scaffolding for this job was raised on 28 June 2024. The work to clear the guttering was logged as a routine responsive repair to be completed in 20 working days.
10. However, the guttering was not cleared until 30 November 2024. This also greatly exceeded the 20 working days timescale in the landlord’s policy.
11. The landlord’s stage 2 response did not apologise for the incorrect information it had issued at stage 1 about the scaffolding. It would have been appropriate for the landlord to have acknowledged this and to have apologised. The response said that it was experiencing delays in getting access to a neighbour’s property to put up the scaffolding required to access the guttering.
12. It was reasonable that there was some delay when the neighbour was not allowing access to put up the scaffolding. However, there were delays in the landlord pursuing the neighbour for access, which the landlord cannot reasonably account for.
13. The landlord wrote to the neighbour on 22 July 2024 to remind them that it was a condition of their lease to allow access. This was an appropriate step for the landlord to take. However, after issuing the letter to the neighbour, the landlord did not follow up on compliance with the request.
14. It was the stage 2 complaint investigation that highlighted the access issues had not progressed and needed to be referred to another department within the landlord. Landlord internal emails showed that the matter was not referred to the relevant department until 11 September 2024. This was 51 calendar days after the landlord had written to the neighbour.
15. This was an unreasonable delay to progress the access issues which affected the landlord’s ability to clear the guttering. This showed there was inadequate oversight of the job as it had not been monitored to ensure the access issue was pursued. The resident should not have needed to have escalated his complaint for the access problems to be addressed.
16. On 2 May 2025 the resident’s representative contacted the landlord as the resident had said the gutters above his bedroom window had still not been cleared. The landlord provided photos of scaffolding up at the resident’s property to evidence that work had been carried out.
17. On 8 May 2025 the representative sent the landlord photos of the guttering which showed the gutters above the bedroom window had not been cleared. The representative said it appeared that the gutter that most needed clearing had been missed by the operatives.
18. A further work order was raised on 9 May 2025 to inspect and clear the gutters above the resident’s bedroom window. The representative advised that this work was completed but that the resident said it was not carried out until “quarter 4 of 2025”.
19. The landlord’s records showed that the guttering was cleared on 19 July 2025 and the scaffolding removed on 22 July 2025. It was unclear why the two parties had differing opinions on the completion date of the work.
20. It was also unclear why the gutter was not cleared until 19 July 2025 when the job was raised on 9 May 2025 and listed as a routine responsive repair with a timescale of 20 working days. This was another timescale for completing work that the landlord did not meet.
21. The landlord awarded the resident £100 compensation for time and trouble in its stage 1 response. However, the resident’s initial complaint featured 2 other complaint matters. As the landlord awarded £100 for time and trouble for all the complaint points raised, we have attributed £30 of this compensation to the guttering aspect of the complaint. The landlord paid the stage 1 compensation on 18 November 2024.
22. In its stage 2 response the landlord said it was happy to review the compensation awarded at stage 1 once the works had been completed. The landlord said this was to allow for an accurate calculation of the compensation once the date of completion was known.
23. The landlord acknowledged in communication with us dated 8 April 2026 that it had not reviewed the compensation upon completion of the works. This was a missed opportunity to remedy the delays the resident had experienced in the landlord resolving the problem with the guttering.
24. In line with our compensation guidance, we have ordered the landlord to pay the resident compensation for the time and trouble needed to pursue a complaint to get all parts of the guttering cleared.

25. The landlord’s complaints and feedback policy, including complaint definition and timescales, were compliant with the Code.
26. An extension at stage 1 was requested by the landlord as it said further investigation and information was needed. The extension request was reasonable and in line with the landlord’s policy and the Code.
27. All acknowledgements and responses were issued within the correct timescales in line with the landlord’s policy and the Code.

Learning

Knowledge information management (record keeping)

28. We would encourage the landlord to review the recommendations in our Spotlight Report on Knowledge and Information Management (KIM) and the key learnings in our Spotlight Report on complaints about repairs. This is to decide if it needs to take any action to improve its oversight of jobs, so work orders are progressed in a timely manner when further action on matters like access are needed.

Communication

29. The landlord should ensure its communication and complaint responses are accurate and contain correct information. This is to prevent a recurrence of what happened in the stage 1 response of this complaint where the landlord incorrectly stated scaffolding had been put up when it had not due to access issues.