Lambeth Council (202104665)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202104665

Lambeth Council

30 May 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 the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of a leak.

Background

  1. The complainant is the leaseholder of a ground floor property within a block. The landlord is responsible for handling external repairs and instructs a tenancy management organisation (TMO) to handle internal repairs to its properties.
  2. The resident reported to the landlord on 19 March 2021 that the communal drains were blocked which was causing a back surge of water into her property. It attended this repair the same day, and she said in her stage one complaint that she was told she would receive further contact about it. The resident subsequently experienced an escalation of the leak on 1 April 2021. She relayed that, when she contacted the TMO about this, it directed her to the landlord who sent an operative who was unable to complete the repair. Another operative attended the resident’s property the following day advising her that the repair was the responsibility of the water company. The resident contacted the water company which sent an operative to inspect the issue and informed her that the repair was the landlord’s responsibility. After making further contact with the landlord, it attended on 3 and 4 April to resolve the repair.
  3. In the resident’s complaint to the landlord, she highlighted that the TMO had been uncontactable by telephone since February 2021, and she had twice visited its office to find it closed with no contact information displayed. She was unhappy that the landlord had told her that someone would return after it attended on 19 March 2021, but no one did, leading to the leak recurring. The resident relayed the contacts she was required to make to progress the repair and sought compensation for the damage caused to her decorations and possessions.
  4. The landlord’s final response upheld its stage one response which stated that it carried out the repairs within the appropriate timeframe. It confirmed that the TMO was her first point of contact in the event of a repair and acknowledged that its communication could have been better. The landlord acknowledged that a delay may have occurred due to the division of responsibility for repairs between itself and the TMO and further by the necessity of contacting the water company. The landlord offered her a £50 goodwill gesture in recognition of its communication.
  5. The resident informed the Ombudsman on 8 July 2021 that she continued to be dissatisfied with the landlord’s response to her complaint as:
    1. It did not carry out emergency repairs within 48 hours.
    2. It did not acknowledge that her report was made on 19 March 2021, but repairs were only carried out on 1 and 2 April 2021.
    3. She disputed that the TMO provided contact details for itself while its offices were closed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
    4. Its record keeping relating to its repairs and maintenance was unsatisfactory.
    5. It did not acknowledge her claim for compensation.
    6. It did not carry out a post-inspection of its repair.
    7. It did not acknowledge the impact of the delay on her and her family’s health or the risks to their health.
    8. Its final stage complaint response was provided to her late.

Assessment and findings

Policies and procedures

  1. The landlord’s homeowner’s guide confirms that it is responsible, under its lease agreement with the resident, for the repair of the building including the roof, windows, shared drains, gutters and pipes. Repairs to the interior of the property are the resident’s responsibility.
  2. The landlord’s repairs policy provides for five different priorities for repairs. These have, in decreasing order of priority, response times of 24 hours, two working days, five working days, 30 working days and 90 days respectively. The landlord’s repair timescales webpage states that emergency repairs are those which are a risk to people’s health and safety, or which may be damaging to the property, such as flooding, and these should be completed with 24 hours.
  3. The landlord’s complaints policy provides for a two-stage complaint procedure with a response to be provided within 20 working days at stage one. At the final stage, no timeframe is provided for a response. This policy confirms that a complaint may be made about the standard of service provided by the landlord or one of its contractors. 

The landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of a leak

  1. An aspect of the resident’s complaint is about her insurance claim with the landlord running out of time. This aspect of the complaint will not be assessed in this investigation as complaints relating to insurance matters fall properly within the jurisdiction of the Financial Ombudsman Service (www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk) and the resident may wish to approach the Financial Ombudsman if she wishes to pursue this aspect of her complaint. This is in line with paragraph 39m of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme) which states, ‘The Ombudsman will not consider complaints which fall properly within the jurisdiction of another Ombudsman, regulator or complaint-handling body’.
  2. Additionally, the resident raised concerns about the hazard to her and her family’s health posed by the leak and time taken by the landlord to resolve this. It is beyond the remit of the Ombudsman to assess whether there was a direct impact on the resident’s household’s health. It is the Ombudsman’s role to consider whether the actions taken by the landlord in response her reports were in accordance with its legal and policy obligations, and whether these actions were reasonable in the circumstances of the case. If the resident believes that she or her family’s health was negatively affected by the landlord’s actions or lack of action, she may wish to seek independent legal advice on making a personal injury insurance claim as matters of liability will need to be assessed. Again, the Ombudsman’s remit is determined by paragraph 39i of the Scheme which states ‘The Ombudsman will not consider complaints which concern matters where the Ombudsman considers it quicker, fairer, more reasonable or more effective to seek a remedy through the courts, a designated person, other tribunal or procedure’.
  3. In accordance with the landlord’s repairs policy, it had a responsibility to attend a repair which posed a hazard to the safety of people or the property within 24 hours. The Ombudsman would also expect a landlord to treat such repairs as emergency repairs and attend within 24 hours. It appropriately did so when it received the resident’s report of water back-surging into the property on 19 March 2021.
  4. However, there was a conflict between the resident’s account of the repair on 19 March 2021 and the landlord’s record of the repair. The resident’s stage one complaint escalation on 27 April 2021 said that the operative who attended her property on 19 March 2021 informed her that the main pipe underneath the property had burst which was “a big job” and someone would return to complete the work. The landlord’s report from the contractor recorded that it had attended to unblock the pipes with high-pressure water jetting and recommended a CCTV survey of the pipes to follow.
  5. Based on the evidence provided to the Ombudsman, the landlord responded reasonably to the resident’s report of blocked communal drains on 19 March 2021 by despatching an operative within 24 hours to clear the blockage, with a recommendation for an investigative CCTV survey to follow. This was an appropriate response, in accordance with its repairs policy, and in line with the Ombudsman’s expectations. As the contractor’s report stated that the pipes had been left flowing normally after its attendance, it was reasonable that it had not yet carried out the follow-on CCTV survey by the time the resident reported that the leak had worsened on 1 April 2021. This was because its contractor had already attended to remedy the report of a blockage and there was no evidence that the leak persisted at that point.
  6. While the landlord did attend the resident’s report of the worsening leak on 1 April 2021, an excessive level of involvement was required of her to progress the repair. The information that it provided to the Ombudsman from its investigation of the complaint noted that there was no information relating to referring her to the water company, its basis for doing this or who the staff member was who made the decision to do so. The landlord’s records acknowledged that the water company did attend and confirm that the repair was the landlord’s responsibility. 
  7. The resident noted in her stage one complaint escalation, that when she experienced the worsening of the leak on 1 April 2021, she reported the matter to the TMO, which sent operatives to the property and advised her that she needed to contact the landlord. She said that the TMO offered to contact the landlord if she was unsuccessful in doing so. The landlord sent an operative who was unable to complete the repair and who was unable to arrange a referral directly for the repair to be resolved; this needed to be made by the landlord, which necessitated the resident attempting to contact it again. The resident advised that she was unable to contact the landlord until 2 April 2021 when it despatched another operative who informed her that the repair was the responsibility of the water company. This again necessitated further involvement from the resident in contacting the water company, who arrived later that day, and who contacted the landlord directly to confirm the repair was its responsibility.
  8. The landlord’s stage one and final complaint responses confirmed that the TMO was the resident’s first point of contact when reporting any repair. Its stage one complaint response said that it was unable to comment on her comments about the TMO’s actions as it was a separate organisation and its final response said that it was unable to verify her account of events from its records. This was not a reasonable response from the landlord. As the TMO was instructed by the landlord, it had a responsibility to ensure that the TMO was upholding its service standards. This is particularly important given that it instructs residents to contact the TMO for initial repair reports.
  9. The landlord has not been able to produce evidence which contradicts the resident’s account of having to make several contacts to the landlord, its TMO and her being required to contact the water company over two days before it attended on 3 and 4 April 2021 to complete the repair. Its repair log recorded that it raised a job on 1 April 2021 for an uncontainable leak due to a burst underground water pipe. This was a delay of two days before it attended to resolve the repair which was its responsibility to treat as an emergency. This was a failure by the landlord to act in accordance with its policy.
  10. The resident relayed to this Service that there was a lack of information provided by the TMO on how to contact it for repairs which caused her difficulty in reporting the first signs of the leak on 7 February 2021. The landlord’s final response asserted that letters had been sent to all residents with contact details and posters were visible on the estate and on the TMO’s office door. Evidence to support either party’s view on this has not been provided to the Ombudsman, therefore, this Service is unable to determine whether a failure had occurred. However, a recommendation will be made below.
  11. The resident was dissatisfied with the landlord’s offer of compensation. It is the Ombudsman’s opinion that the offer of £50 it made her in its stage one complaint response was insufficient to recognise the likely distress and inconvenience caused to the resident by the delayed emergency repair and the excess effort required of her to progress this. An additional £100 should be paid to the resident to bring the compensation offer to £150 in total. This is in accordance with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance, available to view at the Ombudsman’s website, which provides for awards of compensation between £50 and £250 where a failure had occurred which had an impact on the resident, but which was of short duration and may not have significantly affected the overall outcome for her.
  12. The landlord’s final response said that it would assess if the damage caused to her walls were structural repairs and, if so, would carry out remedial work. Under the terms of the lease, it had responsibility for repairing the exterior of the property. Given that damage may have occurred to the structure of the property due to a repair which it was responsible for, this was a reasonable response. Regarding the fixtures and the resident’s possessions, the landlord noted that these would need to be claimed for through her insurance. This was in accordance with the lease as the landlord was not responsible for the interior of the property and it was reasonable for it to therefore direct the resident to her insurers for damage to her personal possessions.  
  13. The landlord provided its final complaint response to the resident 25 working days after her escalation of her complaint to the final stage. Given that no timeframe is specified in the landlord’s complaints policy for a final stage complaint response, and that the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code states that a final stage complaint should be responded to within 20 working days, the time taken was not excessive and there was no evidence of a failure.
  14. In conclusion, there was no evidence that the landlord acted unreasonably in its attendance to the property on 19 March 2021. However, it delayed unreasonably and caused the resident to expend an unreasonable level of effort to progress the repair she reported on 1 April 2021. For these failures, an award of £100 compensation should be paid to her in addition to the £50 it already offered her.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration (service failure) by the landlord in its response to the resident’s reports of a leak.

Order

  1. Within 28 days, the landlord should:
    1. Pay the resident an additional amount of £100 compensation.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord should:
    1. Pay the resident the £50 compensation it offered her previously.
    2. Carry out an inspection of the property to assess its liability for repairs to the structure and carry out any repairs identified.
    3. Ensure that contact details for the reporting of repairs are provided to all residents and that these reporting channels are easily accessible.
    4. Review its own and its TMO’s record keeping procedures to ensure that robust records are kept of all repairs interactions to ensure that repairs can be progressed efficiently without excessive involvement from residents.