Ashfield District Council (202504626)

Back to Top

 

Decision

Case ID

202504626

Decision type

Investigation

Landlord

Ashfield District Council

Landlord type

Local Authority / ALMO or TMO

Occupancy

Secure Tenancy

Date

28 October 2025

Background

  1. The resident lives in a second-floor 2-bedroom flat in a purpose-built block. The resident has anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and a borderline personality disorder that the landlord is aware of. The landlord was aware of a history of antisocial behaviour within the block prior to the resident taking on the tenancy. The resident began reporting the antisocial behaviour issues from March 2024.

What the complaint is about

  1. The complaint is about:
    1. The landlord’s response to reports of antisocial behaviour.
    2. How the landlord responded to the complaint.

Our decision (determination)

  1. There was maladministration with the landlord’s response to reports of antisocial behaviour.
  2. There was service failure with how the landlord responded to the complaint.

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

Summary of reasons

  1. In summary, the Ombudsman found that the landlord:
    1. Failed to communicate effectively with the resident so that she was aware of the different roles and responsibilities between the landlord’s function and the council’s community safety role. It failed to provide appropriate and timely updates and there were some delays in responding to the resident.
    2. Failed to progress the actions it needed to in a timely manner leading to delays in tackling the antisocial behaviour.
    3. Failed to keep accurate and appropriate records outlining promised actions such as deep cleans.
    4. Considered helping the resident in her request for rehousing and agreed to offer a direct let. It then offered 2 properties to the resident.
    5. Considered some learning and said it was improving its policies and processes to ensure that it had the right officers in place to address antisocial behaviour reports swiftly.

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.

Order

What the landlord must do

Due date

1           

Compensation order

The landlord must pay the resident £600 compensation made up as follows:

  • £500 for the landlord’s response to the reports of antisocial behaviour (comprising £200 for the delays in actions taken and communication failings in its response and £300 for the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused to the resident by the landlord’s failings).
  • £100 for the delays in the landlord’s complaint handling.

No later than

25 November 2025

2           

Within 6 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord is ordered to carry out a senior management review of this case to identify why the failings have occurred and to consider learning that can be used to prevent similar failings from happening. The landlord must send a copy of its review outcomes and action plan to the resident and to us within this timeframe. 

No later than

09 December 2025

Recommendations

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

Our recommendations

It is recommended that the landlord review its self-assessment of its knowledge and information management based upon the recommendations set out in our Spotlight report on Knowledge and Information Management (May 2023) and follow up report (January 2025) to improve its record keeping practices.

It is recommended that the landlord in its review of its processes and procedures, considers how it can respond to residents with vulnerabilities, ensuring appropriate signposting to support services.

It is recommended that the landlord update the resident concerning her housing application and direct let decision.

Our investigation

The complaint procedure

Date

What happened

24 March 2024 – 7 October 2024

The resident reported antisocial behaviour to the landlord. The ongoing reports involved visitors urinating in communal areas, noise nuisance, reports of criminal behaviour involving drug dealing and using, visitors to the neighbour drinking in the communal areas, the front door being broken, and threats of violence and alleged assault on the resident’s partner on 18 June 2024.

11 November 2024

The resident raised her complaint concerning the landlord’s handling of the antisocial behaviour. She said she was unhappy that she had made repeated reports to the landlord, provided evidence but the landlord had taken no action.

17 December 2024

The landlord issued a stage 1 complaint response. It partially upheld the resident’s complaint due to the infrequent communication and updates provided. It apologised for the impact of this on the resident.

8 February 2025

The resident was not happy with the landlord’s stage 1 complaint response. She requested that the complaint be escalated to stage 2. She said that her windows had been put out, drug users and homeless people were sleeping in the communal areas and that the landlord had done nothing about this. She said she had to leave her home due to her safety concerns.

12 March 2025

The landlord issued its final complaint response. It upheld the resident’s complaint as it said it took too long to respond to her reports of antisocial behaviour. It was taking legal action against some residents and visitors in the block. Its community protection team had increased its patrols. It agreed to offer a direct let to the resident of the next suitable available property.

Referral to the Ombudsman

The resident asked us to investigate as:

  • she was unhappy with the landlord’s communication with her
  • she said that the landlord had not acted upon her reports of antisocial behaviour despite providing it with evidence
  • as a remedy she requested her neighbour be evicted
  • she asked for a suitable alternative property as she was not living at the property
  • she wanted reimbursement for the time she had been affected by the antisocial behaviour

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 reports of antisocial behaviour

Finding

Maladministration

What we did not investigate

  1. The resident told us that the antisocial behaviour had a detrimental impact on her health and wellbeing. It would be fairer, more reasonable and more effective for the resident to make a personal injury claim for any injury caused. This is because the courts are best placed to deal with this type of dispute as they have the benefit of independent medical advice to decide on the cause of any injury and how long it will last. We’ve not investigated this further under any of the complaint grounds. We can decide the overall distress and inconvenience and if a landlord should pay compensation for this.
  2. The landlord refers high risk cases to the council’s community safety team which sits outside of the landlord function. We’ve not investigated the community safety team and its response to the resident’s reports of antisocial behaviour as complaints about this local authority function would sit with the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO). The resident may wish to raise a separate complaint to the local council about this if she is not happy about the way its community safety team handled the antisocial behaviour. She may wish to refer this to LGSCO once it has exhausted the local authority’s complaints process.
  3. The landlord referred to an earlier complaint concerning antisocial behaviour from 27 September 2023. It is not clear whether this exhausted the landlord’s internal complaints process. We have therefore focussed this investigation on the resident’s reports from 24 March 2024 to the landlord’s final complaint response of 12 March 2025.

What we did investigate

  1. The records show that the resident made over 20 reports of antisocial behaviour incidents from 24 March 2024 until her stage 1 complaint of 11 November 2024.
  2. According to the landlord’s antisocial behaviour policy, the landlord should acknowledge antisocial behaviour reports within 1 to 5 working days depending on if the case is deemed high risk or low-level risk. A case involving drug misuse and drug dealing is deemed to be high risk. The landlord’s role is to refer the case to the community safety team within 24 hours or the next working day if a report is received on a non-working day. The landlord will manage all aspects of purely tenancy related issues including any required enforcement action. The community safety team will manage all aspects of the case including enforcement action. According to the landlord’s procedure, residents should be contacted at least every 10 working days.
  3. The evidence shows that the landlord was aware of the antisocial behaviour within the block prior to the start of the resident’s tenancy. It had provided information about the antisocial behaviour to its antisocial behaviour team on 8 February 2024. The community safety team were therefore managing the case prior to the resident’s report to the landlord. The landlord’s records show that the resident made 5 separate reports of antisocial behaviour between 24 March 2024 to 11 April 2024. It is not clear from the records whether the reports were made directly to the landlord or to the community safety team. However, there is no record of the landlord’s response to these reports until the resident’s emails of 14 April 2024 and 23 April 2024 which was inappropriate.
  4. The landlord emailed the resident on 29 April 2024 which was outside of its policy timescale to respond. The landlord said that leave impacted its response, but it should consider monitoring emails so that any high-risk reports can be appropriately actioned. It asked for some further information from the resident, and she provided this the same date including the neighbours involved and visitors. She reported the smell and a puddle of urine, drug use and people screaming and shouting and that she had reported this to the police. She understood after speaking to a colleague that the block was being monitored and a “higher case” was open for it. She hoped for action to be taken to resolve this situation.
  5. The landlord passed the resident’s information to the community safety team who were managing the case on 30 April 2024. The resident made a further report to the landlord on 2 May 2024 of drug paraphernalia being left in the communal areas. We have seen no record of the landlord’s response to this until she emailed again on 20 May 2024 which was inappropriate. It was not clear whether having the incorrect phone number for the resident had impacted on it being able to respond to the resident earlier. It could have emailed at an earlier date considering the serious nature of the resident’s report. This was inappropriate.
  6. The landlord responded on 21 May 2024 saying it had passed the information to its community safety team, and that the community protection team and police were aware. It mentioned that other work was taking place behind the scenes, but it was unable to divulge details of this. It advised that the police were increasing their patrols.
  7. It had also arranged a deep clean which was appropriate. It is not clear from the landlord’s records when or if this happened indicating issues of poor record keeping. The landlord advised again on 31 May 2024 that it had visited and would arrange a deep clean. Whilst it was reasonable for the landlord to visit, there is again no record that the deep clean happened again evidencing poor record keeping practices. The landlord also said it would write to the other residents due to the resident’s report of the door being open allowing the alleged perpetrator’s visitors into the building. However, there is no record of this letter. There is also no record of the deep clean that the landlord said would be requested in its email of 13 June 2024.
  8. As set out in our Spotlight report on Knowledge and Information Management (May 2023) and follow up report (January 2025), without good knowledge and information management, a landlord cannot adequately monitor the completion of actions. The landlord should review its self-assessment of its knowledge and information management if it has not already done so to improve its record keeping practices.
  9. The resident made further reports of antisocial behaviour from 11 June 2024 to 25 June 2024. She also reported an assault by the alleged perpetrator’s partner on her partner on 18 June 2024 who had confronted drug users asking them to leave. The landlord advised the resident on 12 June 2024 that there was an open case with the antisocial behaviour officer. This role sat within the councils’ community safety team.
  10. The landlord wrote to the community safety team on 13 June 2024 attaching evidence from the resident and it suggested that the resident be contacted by the team. It said that the resident was happy to keep providing evidence. It also suggested that a Notice of Seeking Possession (NoSP) needed to be considered.
  11. The evidence shows that the resident would generally contact the landlord supplying evidence rather than going directly to the community safety team who were managing the case. The landlord would then forward to the information to the community safety team, normally the same day or next day which was appropriate. It advised the on 5 August 2024 that it could forward the evidence on to the community safety team and it was only responsible for tenancy or housing issues. However, as the resident may not have been aware of the different roles and responsibilities, the landlord needed to advise the resident at an early point, so she understood how to report the incidents and who was responsible for managing her case. It had clearly caused the resident some frustration as there were several case managers, but this was not within the landlord’s function.
  12. Though the resident continued to report the antisocial behaviour to the landlord, it generally responded to the resident within a reasonable timeframe. There was some delay as highlighted in its responses. We have seen no record of the landlord’s response to her email of 7 October 2024 requesting a phone call. However, the landlord’s records evidence that she phoned the community safety team on 16 October 2024. It would be expected that the landlord phone the resident back.
  13. Following the resident’s stage 1 complaint of 11 November 2024, the landlord asked for someone to phone the resident to discuss her concerns and what options would be available, which included rehousing. The records show that the community safety team phoned the resident to discuss the case. Criminal damage was noted to the resident’s windows and that she was afraid to live there which was understandable. The landlord attended a meeting with the community safety team on 13 November 2024. It agreed to serve a NoSP on the alleged perpetrator. The landlord then confirmed in an internal email of 27 November 2024 that the resident had fled the property. The landlord then emailed the resident to advise of a new community safety team officer who would be managing the case.
  14. The landlord’s email to the community safety team on 28 November 2024 advising that it was astonished that they were still in the same situation with the case 11 months’ later. The evidence shows that the landlord was reviewing all the evidence, and it emailed the community protection team advising that it felt there was more than enough evidence to prepare a NoSP. It would discuss this further in a meeting that afternoon. It was appropriate for the landlord to review all the evidence though it was by this point over 8 months following the resident’s initial reports. The delays were inappropriate given this action was talked about in the landlord’s email of 13 June 2024.
  15. The landlord emailed the police on 3 December 2024 as the resident had reported that 2 windows had been put through and it asked if the police would support the resident’s transfer to a different address. This was reasonable to provide some support to the resident to move to a more suitable location. Given the resident’s vulnerabilities, the landlord could have provided some further signposting to support considering it knew the impact that the antisocial behaviour was having on the resident. The landlord should consider its approach to resident vulnerabilities in dealing with antisocial behaviour cases. We have made a recommendation for the landlord to consider how it approaches vulnerabilities in its review of its processes and procedures. The landlord’s confirmed on the same date that the resident had been accepted back on the housing register.
  16. The landlord’s file note of 9 December 2024 said that there had been numerous interventions including enforcement action and that a closure order was to be sought followed by a NoSP. It described how the resident had been impacted by the neighbour’s actions and her fear of returning to her property which was understandable. There was evidence of joint meetings and correspondence with the community safety team, community protection, and the police. This led to the community safety team gathering witness statements from the resident and her partner on 18 December 2024. CCTV was to be erected to capture further evidence and the landlord said again that a NoSP was being prepared evidencing that this step had not been taken. It is recognised though that the community protection notice was to be served first.
  17. The resident said in her complaint escalation request of 8 February 2025 that she had heard nothing after the case had been reassigned to the community protection officer. The landlord responded on 11 February 2025 to the resident advising that the assigned officer was off work and gave details of another antisocial behaviour officer. This again caused frustration to the resident. The confusion around the different roles and responsibilities would not have helped.
  18. The landlord confirmed in its final complaint response of 12 March 2025 that the CCTV had been erected. It also confirmed that formal action was being taken against the alleged perpetrators of antisocial behaviour in the block. It recognised that action should have been taken sooner, and it agreed that it would make a direct let to the resident of the next available similar property. It agreed its communication relating to the community safety team was inadequate. It upheld the resident’s complaint and apologised that its actions had not met its service standards. This was appropriate; however, the landlord did not consider whether it should pay any compensation in recognition of its failings.
  19. Following on from the landlord’s final complaint response, the landlord offered 2 properties to the resident that she refused due to her antisocial behaviour concerns. The resident told us she was staying elsewhere as she could not go back to the property. She said that 13 windows had been put through in her property. She said that despite her providing evidence to the landlord, and the case being passed around to different case managers, the antisocial behaviour had not been resolved. The landlord has advised us that legal action is ongoing and we have since received confirmation of a county court judgment on the case, dated 27 October 2025.
  20. The Ombudsman considers that there was maladministration in the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of antisocial behaviour. Whilst the landlord has taken some action and its records show that it passed the resident’s evidence and reports to the community safety team, and it offered 2 properties to the resident, there were delays in the actions it had taken and in its communication. This caused distress and worry to the resident, along with the time and trouble caused in supplying evidence and reports of the antisocial behaviour.
  21. Having carefully considered our guidance on remedies, we have ordered the landlord to pay the resident £500 in compensation. This comprises £200 in respect of the communication failings and delays and £300 to recognise the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused to the resident by the landlord’s failings.

Complaint

The handling of the complaint

Finding

Service failure
  1. The resident made a complaint to the landlord on 11 November 2024. We have seen no record of an acknowledgement being sent which was inappropriate. The landlord’s stage 1 complaint response was made on 17 December 2024. This was 26 working days after the complaint was made which was outside of the landlord’s policy and the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code’s (the Code) permitted timescales which was inappropriate.
  2. The Code (the Code) 1 April 2022 required landlords to acknowledge a complaint within 5 days and to respond to stage 1 and 2 complaints within 10 and 20 working days, respectively.
  3. The resident requested an escalation of her complaint on 8 February 2025. The landlord acknowledged the complaint on 12 February 2025 and issued its final complaint response on 12 March 2025. This was 20 working days from its acknowledgement which was in line with its policy and the Code.
  4. The landlord’s complaint responses did not acknowledge the delay in its complaints handling at stage 1 which was inappropriate. The Ombudsman considers that there was service failure in respect of the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint. We have ordered the landlord to pay £100 in compensation to the resident for the identified service failures.

Learning

  1. The landlord advised in its final complaint response of 12 March 2025 that it was improving its policies and processes to ensure that it had the right officers in place to address antisocial behaviour reports swiftly.

Knowledge information management (record keeping) and communication

  1. We have not seen some of the records concerning telephone calls that were made to the resident, the landlord’s initial referral to its community safety team which needed to happen as soon as the resident reported the serious issues concerning drug misuse and dealing according to the landlord’s antisocial behaviour policy. Its record keeping could have been clearer.

Communication

  1. Whilst the community safety team was responsible according to the council’s policy on antisocial behaviour for managing high risk cases such as the resident’s case, the landlord needed to keep track of actions being taken and it could have done more to ensure that the resident received regular updates.

As much of the responsibility for dealing with high-risk antisocial behaviour was with the community safety team, it was evident that this was confusing for the resident. The landlord’s communication could have been clearer with the resident, so she was aware of who to contact.