Great Places Housing Association (202203383)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202203383

Great Places Housing Association

4 November 2022

Our approach

The Housing Ombudsman’s approach to investigating and determining complaints is to decide what is fair in all the circumstances of the case. This is set out in the Housing Act 1996 and the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme). The Ombudsman considers the evidence and looks to see if there has been any ‘maladministration’, for example whether the landlord has failed to keep to the law, followed proper procedure, followed good practice or behaved in a reasonable and competent manner.

Both the resident and the landlord have submitted information to the Ombudsman, and this has been carefully considered. Their accounts of what has happened are summarised below. This report is not an exhaustive description of all the events that have occurred in relation to this case, but an outline of the key issues as a background to the investigation’s findings.

The complaint

1. The complaint is about:
   1. The landlord’s handling of repairs to the resident’s electric heaters.
   2. The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord, a housing association. He has resided at the property since 2009.
3. The resident reported to the landlord on 13 December 2021 that two of his electric heaters were not working. It arranged an appointment for 20 December 2021; however, it did not attend. The resident contacted the landlord the following day and made a further appointment for 7 January 2022, although this was not kept by the resident as he stated he had not been advised of the time the landlord would attend. However, on the same day, the resident then reported he had experienced a total loss of heating in the property. The landlord attended within 24 hours and provided temporary heating. It then attended a repair appointment on 1 February 2021 when it replaced three of the four defective heaters, as one of the replacement heaters was found to be defective. The landlord returned on 14 February 2021 to replace the final heater.
4. The resident informed the landlord on 1 and 16 February 2022 that he was awaiting the outcome of a complaint he had made “around 20 December 2021” regarding its handling of the heating repairs. He was unhappy it had not kept its initial repair appointment, with the length of time taken to complete the repairs and its communication about the repairs.
5. The landlord’s stage one complaint response on 4 March 2022 advised it considered it had followed its policies and procedures when completing the heating repairs but acknowledged there had been delays in resolving the heater replacements. It offered the resident £30 compensation for the identified delay. After the resident escalated his complaint later that day, the landlord issued its final response to him on 11 March 2022, having spoken to him to discuss the complaint. In its final response, the landlord maintained it had followed its procedures correctly and re-offered the £30 compensation.
6. The resident informed this Service on 19 May 2022 that he remained dissatisfied because the landlord had not spoken to him about his experience and had not listened to call recordings. He said the first appointment he had been offered was not kept, and he then had had to wait until 7 January 2022 for the next appointment. The landlord had not given him a time for this appointment, which led to him being unable to provide access, and when it did attend to carry out the repairs, it did not repair the heating but provided him with plug-in heaters instead.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of repairs to the resident’s electric heaters.

7. The landlord, in accordance with the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, has a legal obligation to maintain the structure and exterior of a property and to keep the installations in the property for space and water heating in good repair. Therefore, the landlord had a responsibility to repair the resident’s electric panel heaters when he reported they were defective.
8. The landlord’s responsive repairs policy confirms that it considers the loss of heating for any tenant between 31 October and 1 May to be an emergency repair. This policy specifies it should make the repair safe within 24 hours of receiving the repair report. However, it also states heating faults or breakdowns are routine repairs and no specified timescale is provided for these.
9. It was evident the landlord did not treat the repair as an emergency as, when the resident reported his heaters not working on 13 December 2021, it provided him with an appointment for 20 December 2021, a week later. Furthermore, it did not keep the appointment. When the resident contacted the landlord about this on 21 December 2021, it provided an appointment for 7 January 2021. While it was a failure by the landlord in not keeping this initial appointment, it was reasonable for it to treat the repair as a routine repair as the resident did not report that there was a total loss of heating in the property. The Ombudsman would expect a total loss of heating during the winter months to be treated as an emergency and a partial loss of heating as a routine repair. It was reasonable for the landlord to offer temporary heating to the resident in the meantime. He refused this, therefore any inconvenience he experienced due the partial loss of heating was not as a result of any failing by the landlord.
10. When the resident reported on 7 January 2022 that he had lost all heating, the landlord attended within 24 hours and provided him with temporary heating. While he was unhappy with the time it took to restore his heating, it was reasonable that the landlord provided an alternative, albeit temporary, form of heating while it arranged for the replacement of the heaters. A landlord may not always have the parts available for a repair immediately and therefore it was appropriate for it provide a temporary alternative while the repair awaited completion. This meant it fulfilled its obligation to provide a source of heating for the property. While the resident had access to temporary heating, the Ombudsman would expect the repair to be completed within a reasonable time frame, which would ordinarily be within four to six weeks.
11. Landlord records showed it raised an order for replacement of the resident’s four electric heaters on 14 January 2022, and three of these were replaced on 1 February 2022, with the final heater being replaced on 14 February 2022. This was in excess of the timeframe in which the Ombudsman would expect such a repair to be completed, taking approximately two months since the original report on 13 December 2021. However, it is noted that three of the four faulty heaters were replaced within six weeks, while a further heater was required to replace a defective replacement. Furthermore, some of the heaters were only reported as defective on 7 January 2022, three weeks after the initial report. Therefore, the time taken was not excessive in the circumstances.
12. While the resident was dissatisfied with the landlord needing to make a further appointment to install the final heater due to a defective component, from the information available, it is not possible to determine that this was due to any failure on its part. Furthermore, the landlord’s acted reasonably promptly when returning on 14 February 2022 (13 days later) to complete the repair and did not amount to an excessive delay.
13. The resident was also unhappy the landlord had not contacted him the day before 7 January 2022 to provide a time for the repair and said this gave him insufficient notice to provide access for this. However, it was not disputed the landlord provided the resident with a text confirming the appointment and its responsive repairs policy states it will notify residents when operatives are on their way to an appointment. There is no mention of contact the day before an appointment to provide a time. As it is the resident’s responsibility to provide access for repairs, and he was aware of the appointment date, there was no evidence of failure by the landlord in how it handled the repair appointment.
14. The landlord offered the resident £30 compensation in its complaint responses. Its compensation policy provides for compensation up to £50 for a delay in completing repairs “where a repair has been missed on more than one occasion without the complainant being given due notice”. Considering that the resident had access to temporary heating, the landlord’s delay was not excessive in the circumstances, and that it did not miss more than one appointment, this offer was reasonable and in accordance with its policy.
15. In conclusion, the landlord acted reasonably in its handling of the repairs to the resident’s heating. It appropriately offered him temporary heating when he made his first report of a partial loss of heating, it provided temporary heating when he experienced a total loss of heating, it attended within reasonable timeframes, and offered an appropriate level of compensation, proportionate to the likely inconvenience caused while the repair was outstanding.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

16. The landlord’s customer feedback policy provides for a two stage complaints procedure. This policy specifies it should respond to the resident within ten working days of receipt of the complaint at stage one, and within 20 working days of receipt of the complaint at the final stage. If the landlord is unable to meet either of these timeframes, it should contact the resident to explain why and provide a new response date which should not exceed a further ten working days. This policy also states it should confirm its understanding of the complaint with the resident before proceeding with an investigation.
17. Part of the resident’s dissatisfaction stemmed from the landlord not listening to call recordings in the investigation of his complaint. The landlord’s final stage complaint response acknowledged this, but explained it did not feel this was necessary, given that all calls were noted on its systems. There was no evidence that listening to the call recordings would have affected the complaint outcome for the resident; however, given that part of his dissatisfaction arose from communication issues, it would have perhaps been prudent for the landlord to do so, to enable it to fully address the concerns he raised.
18. The resident informed the landlord on 1 February 2022 that he was awaiting contact about a complaint he made “around” 20 December 2021. He emailed it again on 16 February 2021 to request contact about the complaint. There was no evidence of the landlord acknowledging the complaint or contacting him about it prior to issuing its stage one complaint response on 4 March 2021. Its response at stage one was issued 23 working days after the resident made it aware he had lodged a complaint, but the landlord did not acknowledge this delay, nor whether it had recorded the complaint he said he made around 20 December 2021. While this Service has not seen evidence that the resident did in fact raise a complaint in December 2021, the landlord nevertheless missed an opportunity to address the resident’s concerns about his complaint not being recorded at the time.
19. The landlord’s final stage complaint response on 11 March 2021 noted it had spoken to the resident on the telephone about his outstanding concerns, but this also did not acknowledge the delay in issuing its stage one complaint response.
20. There was no evidence of the resident raising his complaint around 20 December 2021, but the landlord would be expected to address this in its complaint response. It should also have acknowledged that it had not followed its customer feedback policy in issuing its stage one complaint response 13 working days in excess of its specified timeframe. For these complaint handling failures, the landlord should pay £50 compensation to the resident to recognise his inconvenience effort expended in pursuing his complaint.

Determination

21. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord offered reasonable redress to the resident regarding its handling of repairs to the resident’s electric heaters satisfactorily.
22. In accordance with paragraph 52 Of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and Recommendations

Orders

23. The landlord should, within four weeks of the date of this determination, pay the resident £50 compensation for its failures in the handling of his complaint. The landlord should provide this Service with evidence of compliance.

Recommendations

24. The landlord should: 
    1. Pay the resident the £30 it offered for failures it identified in its repair handling.
    2. Consider rewording its responsive repairs policy to make it clear it only considers a total loss of heating to be an emergency repair, and a partial loss to be a routine repair.
    3. Review its record keeping procedures to ensure accurate records are kept of interactions with residents, particularly those with call-handling staff and complaints-handling staff to ensure that sufficient information is available to investigate complaints when they arise.
    4. Carry out refresher training with complaints-handling staff to ensure that complaints are handled in accordance with its customer feedback policy.