Birmingham City Council (202304260)

Background

1. The property is a flat within a block of 6 flats. The block has a communal garden, which the landlord’s records indicate has small sections allocated to each flat – without any form of separation between them. The garden is accessed via a communal drying area to the rear of the block.

What the complaint is about

2. The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of garden works.
3. We have also assessed the landlord’s complaint handling.

Our decision (determination)

4. There was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of garden works.
5. There was no maladministration in the landlord’s complaint handling.

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

Summary of reasons

6. The landlord delayed unreasonably in addressing issues with the paving forming an access route to the garden. Despite arranging an inspection of this as part of its stage 2 complaint response, it took almost 2 years to fully resolve the issue following this.
7. The landlord handled the resident’s complaint in keeping with its 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.

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.

8. In its stage 1 complaint response, the landlord acknowledged that it had failed to complete a clearance of the garden after the resident raised issues with it during her mutual exchange process in 2020. It appropriately apologised for this and said it had now arranged a clearance of the garden which it hoped would resolve the complaint.
9. However, the landlord said it did not uphold the complaint, as the resident had accepted the property as is under the mutual exchange process. The landlord failed to acknowledge that it had agreed to clear the garden in its 2021 stage 1 complaint response and failed to follow through on this – despite the resident providing a copy of this when making her complaint.
10. The resident’s complaint did not provide details of the works she felt were required to the garden. However, an internal landlord email dated 1 September 2023 indicated that it had been working with the resident over the past year and had:
    1. Cleared the garden and communal drying area of fly tipping.
    2. Removed 2 trees which were affecting the structure of storage sheds.
    3. Inspected the storage sheds and agreed to carry out remedial works to these – which were currently ongoing.
    4. Recently inspected the garden again and arranged to remove rubble and grass cuttings.
11. In its stage 1 complaint response, the landlord acknowledged there was an outstanding issue with paving slabs in the garden. These provided the access route to the garden via the drying area. It confirmed it had asked its repairs contractor to attend and inspect this. This was a reasonable first step to addressing this issue.
12. The resident escalated her complaint on the basis that the landlord had not cleared the rubble from the garden as agreed. She said the paving repairs could not be completed until this was cleared.
13. The landlord’s email of 1 September 2023 indicates that it inspected the garden and agreed to clear the rubble ‘in the last 2 weeks’. The landlord’s repairs policy says that it aims to complete routine repairs within 30 days of them being reported. This timeframe had not passed at the point the resident escalated her complaint. It is unclear when the work was completed from the records available to us.
14. In her stage 2 complaint, the resident also expressed concern about her ability to access and maintain her section of garden if other residents allowed theirs to become overgrown. The landlord reasonably said it would carry out a consultation of residents with a view to potentially changing the whole garden back to a communal space. The landlord’s records indicate it completed this consultation, but the outcome is unclear.
15. In its stage 2 complaint response, the landlord said its contractor had inspected the paving on 13 September 2023. It found that the slabs were being disturbed by tree roots which would need removing before they could be re-laid. The landlord referred the matter to the council’s tree officer for an inspection of the tree and roots.
16. Following this there is a gap in the landlord’s records, and we have seen no evidence of what action was taken until 15 April 2024, when it raised a further inspection of the tree roots to its repairs contractor. It is unclear why the matter had not progressed in the 7 months since the landlord’s contractor’s previous inspection.
17. Following this, there is a further gap in records. However, the resident told us on 30 May 2024 that the landlord had now felled the tree, but left the stump and roots in place. The landlord has provided evidence that it completed repairs to relay the paving slabs on 19 May 2025. Again, the reasons for the lack of progress in the intervening 12 months are unclear.
18. The resident has told us that she was forced to repeatedly delay a surgical procedure due to her inability to safely access the garden to support her recovery. She also told the landlord this within her complaint. Despite this, the landlord took almost 2 years from the point of her complaint to fully resolve the issues with the access paving slabs.
19. Due to this we make a finding of maladministration and order the landlord to pay the resident £300 compensation. This is in keeping with our compensation guidance for landlord failures which adversely affected a resident and where a landlord has made no attempt to put things right.

20. The landlord’s complaint policy at the time of this complaint said that it would provide stage 1 complaint responses within 15 working days and its stage 2 complaint responses within 20 working days. While the stage 1 response timescale differed from that required by our complaint handling code during that period, we allowed some discretion in this for local authorities due to the varying timescales across their multiple service areas.
21. The landlord provided its stage 1 complaint response 17 working days after the resident made her complaint. While this was slightly outside of its policy timescale, we do not consider this to have caused any significant detriment to the resident.
22. The landlord’s stage 2 complaint response was provided within the 20 working days its policy allows.
23. The landlord’s complaint responses appropriately addressed the resident’s complaint, and the records provided show that it carried out a thorough investigation liaising with multiple staff members involved in the garden works.
24. We have found no evidence of maladministration in its handling of the complaint.

Learning

25. The landlord failed to show due regard for the resident’s vulnerabilities in its handling of the repairs.

Knowledge information management (record keeping)

26. The landlord failed to provide us with clear records of what repairs were completed to the garden and when, despite us requesting relevant repair logs as part of our information request for the investigation.
27. There are also large gaps in the landlord’s records which mean it has been unable to explain or justify the lengthy delays in works we have identified.

Communication

28. The landlord’s records show it experienced difficulty in contacting the resident by phone, which impeded its ability to communicate with her about the complaint and clarify details.