Hammersmith and Fulham Council (202112783)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202112783

Hammersmith and Fulham Council

29 September 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

This complaint is about the landlord’s handling of the resident’s move following a fire at her property.

Background and summary of events

Background

The resident was a secure tenant of the property whose tenancy began on 20 July 1998. The landlord is a local authority and has described the property as a two-bedroom ground floor flat. The flat is within a house conversion.
The landlord has advised this Service that its records show that the resident had a “history of mild mental health issues”.
The tenancy agreement required the resident to occupy the property as her main or principal home and pay rent weekly in advance. It allowed for her to terminate the tenancy by giving four weeks’ notice in writing.
The landlord has a management transfer process for situations where tenants need to move immediately for safety reasons (including serious anti-social behaviour). This shows that:
1. tenants may be moved into temporary accommodation where no property is available;
2. tenants will need to provide evidence of their need for a transfer and the landlord will conduct an initial interview and risk assessment within 24 hours;
3. where the management transfer is approved, tenants will also be placed in ‘Band 1’ of the landlord’s housing register and be encouraged to consider a mutual exchange;
4. one suitable offer of accommodation is made to the resident and, if this is refused, the landlord will consider whether the transfer status should be withdrawn;
5. there is no dual benefit entitlement as tenants are expected to terminate their tenancy at the previous address and claim benefit on the temporary accommodation address and working tenants will be assessed to check affordability on the new address.
The landlord has a domestic violence policy that shows that:
1. it will offer an interview within 24 hours when a domestic violence disclosure is made to it, offer advice on housing options and complete a risk assessment;
2. if the risk is high, it will complete a Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC) referral;
3. it will liaise with its housing options team if temporary accommodation is needed and consider a management transfer.
The landlord has an emergency and major works decant policy that shows that:
1. it has a duty to provide accommodation when tenants cannot live in their property for reasons such as a fire;
2. a repairs surveyor will visit the property to check the decant requirement and its allocations team will organise temporary accommodation if the emergency decant is approved;
3. tenants moving as a decant will be assumed to be moving permanently (so the rent account for the old property will be closed and a new one set up for the new address);
4. where a tenant will be returning to their existing home, the rent account will remain open and the tenant “would continue to pay rent on their permanent property and not the property they are decanted to”.
The landlord has an emergency and major works decant procedure that shows that:
1. where a resident needs to move out of a property due to fire, a decant property will be made available until they are able to return home;
2. tenants can appeal an offer of temporary accommodation and emergency arrangements may require interim hostel or B&B arrangements;
3. once works to the principal property are complete, it will let the resident know and meet with them to conduct a pre-voids inspection;
4. the tenant is usually still responsible for rent during the decant period.
The Pan-London Housing Reciprocal is a scheme that allows for social housing tenants to access another tenancy in a different London borough where they are at serious risk of harm.
The landlord has a rent income recovery process that shows that it will “ensure residents are made aware of the associated costs” from the start of their tenancy and it takes a “preventative approach that seeks to maximise tenants entitlement to benefits and secure regular payments”. The related rent income recovery procedure shows that, at tenancy sign up, the landlord will explain charges that are not covered by housing benefit and will make a referral to its welfare benefit team where a resident experiences difficulty in making a benefit claim.
The landlord has a corporate complaints policy that sets out a two-stage process that obliges it to respond within 15 working days (at stage one) and 20 working days (at stage two) respectively. This includes the potential for compensation to be awarded to help put things right.

Scope of investigation

The Housing Ombudsman can only consider complaints about the housing management function of member landlords. Complaints relating to the assessment of housing benefit fall under the jurisdiction of the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO) as these are conducted in the council’s capacity as a local authority. This Service is, however, able to consider complaints relating to management transfers and decant moves which are discussed below.

Summary of Events

The landlord’s records show that the resident made a report to it on 17 December 2018 that she was a victim of domestic violence. It noted that she had told it that she would wait until the following year to decide what to do about her tenancy.
The resident has provided evidence to this Service showing that a charity was assisting her during January-May 2019 due to domestic violence perpetrated by her ex-partner and that they were in support of her being moved on safety grounds.
Emails exchanged between the resident and landlord around this time show that the latter was aware that the former’s GP was intending to apply to MARAC and it had been seeking clarity on the resident’s preference regarding her tenancy before noting she said she had decided to return to the property.
The resident has provided a letter from the Police that confirms her case was discussed at the local authority MARAC on 28 May 2019.
The landlord’s internal emails show that it became aware on 30 July 2019 that there had been a fire at the property the previous day and there was a suspicion of arson. It noted that the resident had been booked into temporary accommodation.
The landlord wrote to the resident on 7 August 2019 (to the previous property she had moved out of due to the fire), advising that she had a rent account balance of £435.88 that should be paid immediately.
The resident submitted a complaint on 19 August 2019 on the grounds that she had not felt supported since the fire at her previous property and had been placed in an empty temporary accommodation flat with no bed.
According to rent statements provided by the landlord, rent began to be incurred at the resident’s temporary accommodation address from 19 August 2019 at a rate of £290.20 per week. Regular housing benefit payments were made to the rent account between 9 September 2019 and 30 March 2020.
The landlord wrote to the resident on 23 August 2019 (to her previous property), advising that she had rent arrears of £665.96.
The landlord issued a stage one complaint response to the resident on 13 September 2019. It said that this related to her not feeling supported and concluded that:
1. an area manager had attempted to offer regular updates, assist the resident with updating her hotel bookings and told her when unfurnished temporary flats became available;
2. a bed delivery occurred on 16 August 2019 to allow the resident to move into a self-contained temporary accommodation flat.
The landlord wrote to the resident on 22 October 2019 (to her previous property), advising that she had arrears of £1586.28. The letter was described as a ‘start of court action for eviction’ and included a notice of seeking possession (NOSP). A rent statement was included that showed the resident had been in credit on her rent account until 1 July 2019, after which arrears increased at a rate of £115.04 per week.
The landlord noted that the resident telephoned it on 11 December 2019, advising that she was paying rent as she was in temporary accommodation.
The landlord’s ASB case file records show that it made notes in late January 2020, indicating that the resident would not be returning to the previous address once works there were complete.
The rent arrears for the resident’s temporary accommodation address rose between March-August 2020, reaching £4594.26.
The landlord’s rent account records show that the resident advised it on 12 March 2020 that she had been decanted from the previous address.
The resident wrote to the landlord on 3 June 2020, raising concerns that her date of birth of birth had not been added to her Pan-London account, too many housing officers had been involved and she had been required to move due to a fire related to domestic violence.
The landlord’s temporary accommodation team noted in early August 2020 that it understood that the resident had been fleeing domestic violence but was due to return to her previous property and there was internal discussion about how much rent the resident was expected to pay.
On 10 August 2020, all the payments made to the temporary accommodation rent account account up to that point (totalling £2911.26) were transferred out of the account to the rent account for her previous property (reducing the arrears on that account to £3196.20). The landlord’s internal emails show that the resident should only have been liable to pay rent for the previous address and any shortfall on the temporary accommodation account would need to be covered by the housing area office.
Rent continued to be charged at the resident’s temporary accommodation address from August 2020 to May 2021 (with housing benefit also being paid up until March 2021).
Rent continued to be charged at the resident’s previous property from August 2020 at a rate of £112.08 per week. The resident made six payments to that rent account up to February 2021 (when the landlord issued a rent statement to the resident by email).
The landlord issued a stage one complaint response to the resident on 9 September 2020. It concluded that:
1. it apologised for poor communication and for telling her she needed to return to her previous address;
2. the resident was registered with Pan-London and it had widened the preferred area to improve her chances of a move;
3. it would assist her with the mutual exchange process albeit the preferred postcode she had offered meant the chances of a move were small;
4. they had discussed the potential of surrendering the tenancy but the resident wished to retain it so she could explore the mutual exchange.
The landlord’s records show that the resident advised it on 17 September 2020 that she had been in temporary accommodation for over a year.
The resident and landlord exchanged emails on 30 September 2020 as follows:
1. the resident queried why she had not been housed yet, said she should never have been asked to give up her tenancy and alleged she had been treated with disrespect;
2. the landlord said it had spoken to her and agreed to contact Pan-London for her and would send her a form so she could confirm a preferred move location.
The resident wrote to the landlord on 15 October 2020, asking what had happened to documents she previously submitted as part of a transfer request and complaining that she could not speak to Pan-London directly and she needed photographs of her previous address for mutual exchange purposes.
The resident submitted a complaint on 6 November 2020 on the grounds that she was confused about her rent and had been asking for the 52-week dual benefit to be paid for some time. The landlord noted contact with the resident on this date when she said her case had been heard at MARAC and a transfer agreed but she was still waiting to be re-housed and being charged rent on two addresses in the meantime. It also recorded that it had told the resident that it had transferred her rent payments to the previous address as that was her principal home.
The landlord issued a stage one complaint response to the resident on 26 November 2020. It concluded that:
1. a housing manager had stayed in regular contact with her but it had apologised that there had been conflicting information given about her rent liability at her previous address and whether she was supposed to return there;
2. the resident would not be required to return to her previous address and was instead being supported with a move outside the borough;
3. joint meetings had been held with officers from housing, rents and welfare benefits to resolve the rent account issue and the resident had now been told to start paying rent to her previous address account;
4. the resident said on 19 November 2020 that she was satisfied with the plan of action regarding rent, which included a budget exercise with a benefits officer and discussions about a payment arrangement to clear the arrears;
5. it had contacted Pan-London to add additional safe areas to her application and would arrange photographs of her previous address (to assist with the mutual exchange) and get a new preferred postcode registered for her once it received her form;
6. it had discussed surrendering her tenancy at her previous address and offered reassurance that her secure tenancy status would be maintained.
The landlord’s records show that the resident told it on 10 December 2020 that she did not need assistance from its welfare benefits team as she was now working and would pay rent every four weeks but it recommended she make a discretionary housing payment (DHP) application.
The landlord noted that it submitted a DHP request for approval on 18 January 2021.
The resident and landlord exchanged emails during late February to early March 2021, showing that the former was still unclear about her rent liability and said she had been asking about this since August 2020. The landlord said it had been meeting with the resident and told her that the rent account at the previous property would continue because she had refused to terminate the tenancy.
The resident signed a vacation notice dated 28 March 2021 that showed she was ending her tenancy at the previous property as she had transferred to a housing association property.
The landlord wrote to the resident by email on 30 March 2021 with a rent arrears letter (and a statement for the period September 2020 to March 2021) that showed a balance of £4531.76 for her previous property. This letter also signposted the resident to its welfare benefit team.
The landlord wrote to the resident on 1 April 2021, explaining that she was not liable for rent at the temporary accommodation as this was an emergency decant but she was liable for rent at the previous address. It added though that housing benefit was being paid at the temporary accommodation address and the landlord was topping up any shortfall. It acknowledged that there had been some confusion at the beginning of the tenancy and all payments had been transferred from her temporary accommodation account to the rent account for her previous address.
The balance on the resident’s rent account for her previous property had increased to £4871.36 at the point the resident submitted a complaint in early April 2021.
The landlord’s temporary accommodation team noted on 12 April 2021 that it had again informed the resident that she was not liable for rent at the temporary accommodation address.
The resident submitted a complaint on 13 April 2021. She said that the landlord had agreed back payment of rent for her previous address, she had not heard from her housing officer for a while, she had asked when works would be finished and she wanted to know why she had now been told to pay rent at her temporary accommodation.
A DHP award of £1776.54 was made against the resident’s rent account for her previous address on 19 April 2021, reducing the arrears to £3208.58.
The landlord has provided a copy of an email it apparently sent to the resident around this time that advised:
1. she had been decanted into temporary accommodation due to a fire at her previous address, not for domestic violence reasons;
2. rent charges were not reduced on the previous address as the temporary accommodation was being paid for (so dual benefit was not needed);
3. if she had been liable for rent at both properties, she would only have been eligible for dual benefits for 52 weeks (August 2019 to August 2020);
4. housing benefit was in payment at the new address and this had ceased from 5 April 2021 and the area office would cover the rent going forward;
5. as there had been confusion about where she was liable for rent, it had awarded a DHP of £1776.54 for her previous address which it said was supposed to at least cover the amount of Universal Credit she would have been entitled to (which it said was £1519.03 by its calculations);
6. she was still in considerable arrears for rent at her previous address and she needed to make payments accordingly.
Following contact from the resident, this Service wrote to the landlord on 22 April 2021, asking it to progress the complaint. The resident also wrote to the landlord on 9 May 2021, expressing continued dissatisfaction on the grounds that:
1. it had incorrectly said that her case was not a domestic violence one;
2. it had initially decided she could have benefit paid on two properties but this was reversed and she was not told in writing;
3. she wanted to know why she was being charged full rent for an uninhabitable property;
4. she was not able to claim Universal Credit because of delays by the landlord;
5. there had been too many housing officers which is why she had been told to pay rent a year after it realised she was still in temporary accommodation;
6. the landlord had delayed in assisting her with her Pan-London application and only offered her properties in a narrow area so she felt she had to exchange properties to secure a move.
The rental charges for the resident’s previous property ended on 10 May 2021 with the arrears standing at £3436.10.
The rent arrears on the temporary accommodation account stood at £1546.89 when the account was amended on 31 May 2021 so that it had a nil balance.
The landlord’s internal emails show that it had reviewed its past handling of the case up to June 2021 and found that:
1. £2911.26 had been paid to the resident’s temporary accommodation rent account and this had been transferred to her previous address rent account on 13 August 2020;
2. this had reduced the previous address rent arrears from £6475.38 to £3564.12;
3. a DHP of £1776.54 had further reduced the arrears;
4. there were still question marks over whether it should have acted on harassment reports in 2018-19, a delay between the management transfer approval (July 2019) and her being contacted to move and when she initially completed a Pan-London application.
The landlord noted on 9 June 2021 that the resident told it that:
1. she had left the previous address due to fire in July 2019 and had been in hotels until moving into the temporary accommodation address in September 2019;
2. she had informed it that she could not return to the previous address due to domestic violence (as supported by Police reports);
3. she was previously told to pay rent at the new temporary accommodation address and received housing benefit accordingly.
The landlord noted on 9 June 2021, 28 June 2021 and 8 July 2021 that it had told the resident it had extended the complaint response timescale due to the complexity of the case.
The landlord issued a final complaint response to the resident on 22 July 2021. It said it had considered new issues that had not been part of the original complaint and concluded that:
1. housing benefit was not payable on the two properties simultaneously as the resident had been decanted to the new address and housing benefit stops when a tenant no longer intends to return to a property;
2. housing benefit could have been paid at the new address and rent stopped at the previous address had the resident agreed to end her tenancy but she did not wish to do so;
3. payments made to the rent account for the new address were transferred to the account for the previous address on 13 August 2020 and a DHP of £1776.54 had also been made for the previous address;
4. it had no record that the resident had asked to move away from the previous address due to domestic violence;
5. it had discussed the resident’s housing options with her, reassuring her that she would be given a permanent move due to it being unsafe to return to the previous address and taking into account that she was unable to move to many areas in the borough;
6. the resident had registered for a move outside the borough through a Pan-London application but it had delayed in processing the application for which it apologised and awarded £100 compensation;
7. housing associations register their properties through the Pan-London and local authority processes;
8. its priority during the management transfer process was to ensure her safety and it apologised that no explanation was given to the resident that housing association properties do not offer the right to buy before she signed her new tenancy.
The resident approached this Service in September 2021, advising that she had been a domestic violence victim and her property had been fire damaged so she was moved into temporary accommodation. She raised concerns that her landlord had continued to charge rent on the property and there had been poor communications due to a change in housing officer.
The resident added in October 2021 that the landlord had failed to grasp why she had been placed in temporary accommodation and she had been stuck having to retain her tenancy at her previous address (and pay rent on an uninhabitable property) so the mutual exchange was possible but the landlord had failed to move her to a safe place.

Assessment and findings

The Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles are:

Be fair
Put things right
Learn from outcomes

This Service will apply these principles when considering whether any redress is appropriate and proportionate for any maladministration or service failure identified.

The resident made an initial report of domestic violence to the landlord in December 2018 and said she would consider her housing options and let it know her preference. Although the resident was supported by a charity over subsequent months and a MARAC hearing considered her case in May 2019, there is no evidence that the landlord was asked to transfer her or recommended to take any other actions due to the domestic violence report. There was therefore no service failure on the part of the landlord in it failing to apply its management transfer or domestic violence policies prior to the fire at the resident’s property in July 2019.
Following the fire, the resident was moved into interim hotel accommodation before she was placed into a self-contained temporary accommodation flat in August 2019. Although there is no record of how the landlord assessed the habitability of her property and the repairs required, it acted in accordance with its emergency and major works decant processes by initially moving the resident to a hotel before sourcing self-contained accommodation for her.
However, it is unclear that the landlord determined at this point whether the resident was to return to the fire-damaged property once it was repaired and no clarity was offered to her as to what would happen with her tenancy and rent liability. The landlord later acknowledged that there was confusion on its part but it was inappropriate that it charged her for rent on both her principal and temporary accommodation addresses between August 2019 and August 2020.
The landlord issued rent arrears recovery notices to the resident’s fire-damaged property during this period, including a NOSP, despite being aware that it had moved her into a temporary accommodation address and so she was unlikely to receive this correspondence. This indicates that different parts of the organisation failed to take a co-ordinated approach and meant that the resident was not informed that it expected her to continue rent payments to her principal property account (and so she instead paid towards her temporary accommodation).
The landlord missed opportunities to resolve the double rent charging in December 2019 and March 2020 when the resident reminded it that she was in temporary accommodation and it was not until August 2020 that it attempted to rectify the matter by transferring her payments to the rent account for her principal property. Following this, the resident made payments to the correct rent account which indicates that the landlord clarified its advice appropriately at this point and its decision to award DHP in January 2021 helped to reduce the resident’s rent arrears. However, it failed to put right the distress and inconvenience caused to the resident or investigate how the rental charge error had occurred.
The landlord’s emergency and major works decant procedure shows that a tenant is usually responsible for rent at their damaged property while they are away in temporary accommodation. There was therefore no service failure on the part of the landlord for continuing to charge rent on what the resident described to be an uninhabitable property, particularly given it later noted that this rent level was lower than that which the resident would have been required to pay for the temporary accommodation. Further, according to both its management transfer and emergency decant policies, there was no obligation on the landlord to arrange dual benefits for both rent accounts.
Nevertheless, the landlord’s communication with the resident was limited and meant that the resident was understandably confused by her rental liability for more than a year after her move. The landlord added to this confusion by failing to pro-actively communicate with the resident to establish a plan of action to either allow for her return to the property or assist her with a permanent move to new accommodation. It was unreasonable that it did not offer any meaningful re-housing guidance or advice on when her principal home would be habitable between July 2019 and September 2020.
When the landlord reviewed the resident’s case in June 2021, it noted that it had awarded her management transfer status in July 2019 but there is no record as to how it attempted to secure a move for her. It was unreasonable that the landlord left the resident in temporary accommodation between July 2019 and September 2020 without offering assurance as to how it intended to help her with a permanent move, particularly after it noted in January 2020 that she was not intending to return to her property and given it was aware of her previously reported domestic violence and “mental health issues”.
In mitigation, there was some complexity with the resident’s circumstances as she said it was unsafe for her to live in most parts of the borough (which would have made a management transfer more difficult) and, although she did not want to return to her principal home, she told the landlord that neither did she wish to end her tenancy as she wanted to use it to explore the mutual exchange option (which meant that her rental liability continued in accordance with her tenancy agreement). Nevertheless, the landlord’s communications with the resident were limited, it failed to offer a likely timescale for a move given her preferences and it later acknowledged that it had contributed to delays in processing her Pan-London application. This will have caused inevitable uncertainty to the resident up to March 2021 when she submitted her notice that she wished to end her tenancy as she had found alternative accommodation.
Although the landlord apologised for miscommunications and confusion about rental liability, arranged a DHP and awarded £100 compensation for delays in it assisting with the resident’s Pan-London application, this did not offer sufficient redress given the circumstances of the case. The level of compensation was within a range that the Ombudsman would recommend for a minor service failure that has had limited impact. Given the resident’s domestic violence concerns and that the landlord mismanaged her rental liability and contributed to a lack of clarity about her re-housing arrangements for more than 12 months, it should have awarded compensation that reflected a significant failure over an extended period of time. Its failure to award sufficient compensation and demonstrate that it had learned lessons from the case meant that it did not in accordance with the Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles.

Determination

In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in its handling of the resident’s move following a fire at her property.

Reasons

The landlord charged the resident for rent at both her principal property and temporary accommodation for more than 12 months after she had to move due to a fire. It also failed to pro-actively support her to secure a permanent move even after it was aware of her concerns about returning to the principal property due to a history of domestic violence. Although there were mitigating factors and the landlord acknowledged some of its failings, it did not award sufficient redress given the circumstances of the case.

Orders

The landlord to write to the resident within four weeks of the date of this report to:
1. apologise for the service failures identified in this report;
2. if it has not already done so, update her on her outstanding rent balance for the principal property and advise her whether it is able to agree a payment arrangement to clear this.
In addition to the £100 offered in its final complaint response, the landlord to pay the resident compensation of £500, within four weeks of the date of this report, in recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused to her by the service failures in its handling of her move following a fire at her property.
The landlord to provide assurance that it has sufficient guidance and procedures in place to ensure that:
1. rent accounts are correctly administered in future when a resident needs to be decanted from their principal property into temporary accommodation;
2. it pro-actively communicates with residents who are in temporary accommodation, including regular reviews of their circumstances and clear plans for either re-housing or a return to their principal property.

The landlord should provide evidence to this Service within eight weeks of the date of this report to show how it has complied with this order.