Birmingham City Council (202432541)

Decision
Case ID	202432541
Decision type	Investigation
Landlord	Birmingham City Council
Landlord type	Local Authority / ALMO or TMO
Occupancy	Secure Tenancy
Date	25 February 2026

Background

The resident’s tenancy of a new build house started on 4 March 2024. He has a diagnosis of arthritis. However, the landlord’s records show that there are no vulnerabilities within the household. In August 2024 he complained that there were ongoing issues with heating and hot water in the property. The landlord advised us that the property was part of a pilot scheme trialling energy saving technologies which included an air source heat pump. This technology was new to the developer and installer. The property was subject to a 12-month defect liability period.

What the complaint is about

The landlord’s handling of an ongoing intermittent loss of heating and hot water.
We have also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Our decision (determination)

There was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the intermittent loss of heating and hot water.
There was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the complaint.

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

Summary of reasons

Heating and hot water

There was a delay of 16 months in the landlord rectifying the intermittent loss of heating and hot water. It was unable to provide evidence of the action taken following each report. The landlord offered compensation but this was 9 months after it issued the stage 2 complaint response.

Complaint handling

The landlord did not use the complaints process to bring the issue to an early resolution. It did not complete a thorough investigation into the cause of the issue and did not follow the remedy offered through to completion.

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	Apology order The landlord must apologise in writing to the resident for the failures identified in this report. The landlord must ensure: A manager provides the apology. The apology is specific to the failures identified in this decision, meaningful and empathetic. It has due regard to our apologies guidance.	No later than 25 March 2026
2	Compensation order The landlord must pay the resident £1,075 made up as follows: £900 for the time, trouble, distress, and inconvenience caused by its handling of an intermittent loss of heating and hot water. £175 for the time, trouble, distress, and inconvenience caused by its complaint handling. It must pay this directly to the resident and provide documentary evidence of payment by the due date. The landlord may deduct from the total figure any payments it has already made.	No later than 25 March 2026
3	The landlord must contact the resident to find out about any vulnerabilities within the household and update its records to reflect this. It must complete this and provide evidence by the due date.	No later than 25 March 2026

Recommendations

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

Our recommendations
The landlord should ensure that developers keep records of actions taken following repairs call outs so that it can investigate any issues.
When taking over properties which contain innovative technology, the landlord should make sure that it has the correct expertise in place to maintain the systems and trouble shoot issues.
The landlord should ensure that it addresses the new issue that the resident has highlighted with the heating system appropriately and in line with its policies.

Our investigation

The complaint procedure

Date	What happened
23 August 2024	The resident complained to the landlord. He said that: There had been ongoing issues with the heating in the property since he had moved in. Initially the radiators upstairs would turn on when he turned on the underfloor heating downstairs and vice versa. Additionally, the heating and hot water system would turn off every 2 weeks unless manually restarted. Now only the radiators worked and the underfloor heating did not. Numerous engineers had been out but the problem persisted. The landlord had now told him that a contractor would give him training on how to use the system. However, this was not necessary and the fault should be fixed.
23 August 2024	The landlord acknowledged receipt of the complaint.
6 September 2024	The landlord provided a stage 1 complaint response. It said that: A contractor would contact the resident direct to arrange a convenient time to visit the property to assess the issue and plan an appropriate course of action. If the contractor did not contact him by 20 September 2024, he should contact the complaint handler.
9 October 2024	The resident asked the landlord to escalate the complaint to stage 2 of the complaints process. He said that: Operatives had fixed the underfloor heating and told him that the fault lay with incorrect piping and wiring. However, the heating system was still not working properly. The immersion heater switched on and disabled both the hot water and the central heating and the water temperature kept dropping. He was left without heating and hot water for 2 days at a time. He had raised the issue multiple times since moving in but felt that the landlord had ignored him and suggested that the fault lay with how he operated the system.
18 October 2024	The landlord acknowledged receipt of the stage 2 escalation request.
28 October 2024	The landlord provided a stage 2 complaint response. It said that: It had emailed the agent acting on its behalf who were responsible for the heating installation and requested training on the system for all residents of the estate. The agent had said “The issue here is the contractor is saying there is no issue, and this is tenant error. My suggestions would be that when we conduct training at this property (with all stakeholder’s present) we allow an additional amount of time to get to the bottom of these issues once and for all. All relevant trades will be present then, so I think this is the best approach.” The resident could contact the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman if he was unhappy with the complaint response.
21 July 2025	The landlord provided a further complaint response. It said that: It apologised for the way it had handled the resident’s complaint and for the length of time it had taken to complete the repairs. It offered £925 compensation comprising £575 for the delays in resolving the issue with the heating system, £150 for not following its complaint policy, and £200 for the distress and inconvenience caused.
Referral to the Ombudsman	In February 2026 the resident told us that he would like the landlord to take accountability for the issue, particularly as it did not thoroughly investigate the contractor’s assertion that the issue was caused by user error. He advised us that the heating issue was rectified but the system still has a fault as it is not working efficiently. In February 2026 the landlord told us that the issue was finally resolved on 17 July 2025 when a joint visit between it, the manufacturer, installer, and developer took place. During this visit the contractors completed some rewiring of the system, altered dip switches and sensors so that the heating controls worked, and disconnected a stat from zone 1.

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	Heating and hot water
Finding	Maladministration

The landlord’s repairs policy says that it will complete urgent repairs within 1, 3, or 7 working days based on the Right to Repair regulations 1994. The Right to Repair regulations state that landlords must repair a total loss of heating and hot water that occurs between 31 October and 1 May within 1 working day. If the total loss of heating and hot water occurs between 30 April and 1 November then landlords must generally repair it within 3 working days.
There is evidence that the resident first reported an issue with the heating on 6 March 2024. He then reported a complete lack of heating and hot water on 18 March 2024. In total, between moving into the property and the time the landlord rectified the issue, the resident reported 10 non-urgent issues with the heating and hot water system and made a further 10 reports of a complete lack of heating and hot water. This cost him considerable time and trouble.
We asked the landlord to provide evidence of what action it, or a contractor, took after each report and when the heating was restored on each occasion. However, it told us that it referred any issues reported by the resident directly to the developer. It said that it had asked the developer to provide this information but they had not done so and therefore it could not provide this to us. This record keeping failure means that we are unable to complete a full investigation into the reasons for the delay in resolving the problem. Furthermore, the landlord should have requested this information from the developer as part of its complaint investigation. Notwithstanding the absence of evidence as to the causative factors and efforts made to remedy the heating downtime it is not disputed that the downtime occurred and adversely impacted on the resident.
Six of the times that the resident reported a lack of heating and hot water occurred between 31 October 2024 and 1 May 2025. The resident advised us that his reports usually resulted in a lack of heating and hot water for 2 days at a time. This caused him considerable distress and inconvenience especially considering that he has a diagnosis of arthritis and he told us that the symptoms were made worse by the cold temperatures within the property. He informed us however, that the landlord or contractor provided some fan heaters but he was unsure of the date they were supplied.
There is evidence that the landlord told the resident that a contractor thought that user error was the cause of the issue and it offered him further training on several occasions. This was despite the resident taking time and trouble to provide photographs of the control panel to demonstrate the fault. This caused him distress and frustration because he felt that the landlord was not taking his concerns seriously.
The landlord finally arranged a joint visit between the necessary parties in July 2025. This was 16 months after the resident first reported the issue. Had the landlord completed a more thorough investigation earlier and not relied on the contractor’s assertion that the issue was due to user error, this visit would have taken place sooner. This failing resulted in the household enduring continued occurrences of no heating and hot water and the distress of not knowing when the issue would reoccur. It also cost the resident considerable time calling and emailing the landlord and attending numerous appointments.
The landlord did not offer any compensation to the resident during the complaints process. However, it offered him £925 approximately 9 months after the stage 2 complaint response. This included £575 for the delays in fixing the problems with the heating and £200 for distress and inconvenience.
Although this could be said to have put things right for the resident, the landlord failed to resolve the substantive issue of the complaint until several months after it had issued its final response. It also did not fully acknowledge its failings or make the increased offer of compensation until the case had been accepted by this Service for investigation. The Ombudsman’s outcomes guidance is clear that a finding of reasonable redress cannot be determined under such circumstances. This is particularly the case where the landlord has not demonstrated specific learning points to ensure that similar failings do not occur in future.
Therefore, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of an ongoing intermittent loss of heating and hot water and we have ordered it to directly pay the resident £900 for this element of the complaint. The landlord may deduct from this figure the £775 offered previously for this element of the complaint if it has already directly paid this amount.

Complaint	The handling of the complaint
Finding	Maladministration

The Housing Ombudsman’s complaint handling code (the Code) says that complaint handlers must fully investigate and consider all relevant information and evidence carefully. It also says that complaint handlers must have the authority and autonomy to act to resolve disputes promptly and fairly.
However, in this case the landlord did not obtain all the relevant information prior to issuing the complaint responses. We have seen no evidence that it considered how many times the resident had called it and what issues were preventing a resolution. Had the complaint handler done this, and had the authority and autonomy to recommend a joint meeting sooner, the issue would have been resolved more quickly. Instead, the complaint responses merely passed on information received from the service area and this meant that their handling of the situation remained unchallenged. This error cost the resident time and trouble because he had to contact us for a resolution.
The Code also says that landlords must provide the resident with details on how to escalate the matter to this Service if they remain dissatisfied.
However, in this case the stage 2 complaint response signposted the resident to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman. This error may have delayed his access to an investigation by us.
The Code also says that complaint handlers should follow all remedies through to completion.
In this case the stage 2 complaint response said that the agent would arrange a training session with all parties present. However, this did not take place for a further 9 months during which time the heating system was still failing. Had the landlord monitored the remedies to make sure they were followed through to completion the issue would have been resolved sooner. This error cost the resident further time and trouble reporting further instances and the ongoing issue caused him further distress.
In summary, the landlord did not use the complaints process to effectively resolve the issue and it did not recognise any complaints handling failings during the complaints process. However, 9 months later it offered £150 compensation because it had not followed its complaints procedure.
Again, this could be said to have put things right for the resident, but the landlord failed to resolve the substantive issue of her complaint until several months after it had issued its final response. It also did not fully acknowledge its failings or make the increased offer of compensation until the case had been accepted by this Service for investigation. The Ombudsman’s outcomes guidance is clear that a finding of reasonable redress cannot be determined under such circumstances. This is particularly the case where the landlord has not demonstrated specific learning points to ensure that similar failings do not occur in future.
Therefore, there was maladministration in its handling of the resident’s complaint and we have ordered it to pay him £175 compensation for the time, trouble, distress, and inconvenience caused. The landlord may deduct from this figure the £150 offered previously for this element of the complaint if it has already paid this amount.

Learning

The landlord should make sure that complaint handling staff are aware of the appropriate Ombudsman to signpost residents to.

Knowledge information management (record keeping)

There was a record keeping failure because the landlord was unable to provide evidence of actions the developer took each time they attended the property. It should have considered this evidence when responding to his complaint.

Communication

The landlord did not proactively keep the resident updated throughout the process.