Leeds City Council (202105929)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202105929

Leeds City Council

26 January 2021

 

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 handling of repairs to the resident’s boiler.

Background and summary of events

Background

  1. At the time of the complaint, the resident was a tenant of the landlord and lived in a two-bedroom flat.
  2. Section 10.7 of the tenancy agreement states that the resident must allow access to the property for repair.
  3. The landlord’s repairs policy states that total or partial loss of heating or hot water is classed as an emergency repair between 1 November and 30 April. It states that in the case of emergency repairs, it will attend within three hours and complete an emergency repair within 24 hours.
  4. The landlord has a two-stage complaint process. It aims to respond at stage one within 15 working days (including by telephone). At review stage it aims to respond within 28 days.

Summary of events

  1. The resident raised an issue with her boiler on 13 March 2021. A gas engineer visited the resident’s property on the same date to repair the boiler. The engineer identified that the boiler required an expansion vessel as it was losing pressure and shutting off.
  2. On 15 March 2021, the landlord contacted the resident and left a voicemail message to arrange an appointment to fit the required part. On 18 March the landlord arranged an appointment for the gas contractor to attend on 19 March.
  3. The appointment on 19 March 2021 was marked as no access but the landlord later found that the appointment was not attended as the engineer claimed he had gone to the wrong address.
  4. On 23 March the contractor attended an appointment to fit the expansion vessel on the boiler. The resident raised an emergency repair with the out of hours team on the same day, reporting that the boiler was noisy. The landlord stated that this fault would have not been identified during previous visits as it was an entirely different fault. The boiler was replaced on 26 March 2021.
  5. On 23 March the resident raised a complaint with the landlord about the gas contractor. In her complaint she raised the following points:
    1. Her boiler broke down on 13 March 2021. An engineer came to repair it on the same date but as it needed a new part, he said it could only be fixed on 15 March. She asked if it could be fixed any sooner and she was told to contact the office on 15 March, and it would be fixed on that day.
    2. She took the day off from work on 15 March as she thought the boiler would be fixed that day, but it was not. When she called the landlord for an update, she was told that someone would call her back, but no one did.
    3. She called the landlord again on 16 March and was told that the boiler would be repaired on Friday (19 March). She explained that she had a child in the house, and it was cold. She also said that she could not take another day off from working but she was told that the boiler could not be repaired if she was not at home.
    4. She arranged to take the day off from work on 19 March and called the landlord on 18 March to explain that water was leaking from the boiler’s pipes. She said she was reassured that her boiler would be repaired the next day.
    5. She called the landlord on 19 March to ask what time the engineer would arrive and was told it was an all-day appointment, but the engineer would be there by 5pm. She called the landlord again when no one had arrived after 5pm and was told the engineer was on his way and would arrive by 7pm. She called the landlord a third time and was told that the engineer would not be attending the property as he had finished work for the day, and she would have to arrange another appointment the following week. She received a text message at 11pm stating the engineer was on his way and then another message two minutes later which said the engineer could not access her property. She explained that she was on the balcony at the time and had not seen anyone at the main entrance.
    6. She was angry that she waited at home all day on 15 and 19 March and no one came to repair her boiler which led to her losing her job.
    7. She received another text on 20 March which said that an engineer was on his way but when she called to ask about this, she was told it was a mistake and she would need to call back on Monday (22 March) as they did not have the part needed to repair the boiler. She said she was offered electric heaters to be delivered to her but she declined this as it would be expensive to run them and they would not last long.
    8. She did not understand why the repair had been scheduled for 19 March when the part was not available. The incorrect information had led to her losing her job and she wanted compensation for this.
    9. On 23 March an engineer came to repair the boiler but made it worse which caused water to leak from it. She called the repairs team, and the same engineer came back to investigate the issue, then he contacted his supervisor to report that the boiler needed replacing.
  6. Landlord staff spoke to the resident on 24 March to explain that the engineer had been disciplined and a new boiler would be installed on Friday. The landlord has not provided details of its conversation with the resident or evidence of a formal response to the stage one complaint.
  7. The resident contacted the landlord on 15 April 2021 to ask how her complaint would be responded to. The landlord explained that the complaint was closed following a conversation on 24 March. The resident asked for her complaint to be escalated to stage two as she felt that the outcome merited more than an apology as she had to take two days off from work for the appointments to repair the boiler which in turn led to her losing her job. The resident said the complaint should not have been closed after an apology.
  8. The landlord issued its stage two response on 4 May 2021 which stated:
    1. The resident’s complaint was upheld at stage one following an investigation into the poor service provided from the gas contractor. Following a conversation with the resident, an apology was offered, and it seemed that the resident was content to close the complaint.
    2. It contacted the resident on 18 March 2021, to arrange an all-day appointment on 19 March 2021. This appointment was accepted therefore the resident must have agreed to take time off work to allow the gas company to attend the property and carry out the necessary work.
    3. The gas company failed to attend the pre-arranged appointment. However, the landlord did not understand why this caused the resident’s employer to terminate her employment as her time off had been agreed by her employer. This appeared to be an issue between the resident and her former employer and not the gas contractor. It had installed a new boiler in the property and the resident now had fully operational heating and hot water.
    4. It was aware that the manager of the gas contractor spoke to the resident directly to apologise for the poor service and had offered her £150 as a goodwill gesture for the inconvenience of missed appointments and the lack of communication throughout the situation. It understood that the resident declined this offer.
    5. The resident’s complaint had been upheld due to the poor level of service she received from the gas contractor and the £150 goodwill gesture was still available if the resident wished to accept it.
    6. It did not accept that the gas contractor’s failure to attend the pre-arranged appointment caused the resident to lose her job.
  9. The resident referred her complaint to this service as she was unhappy with the level of compensation offered by the gas contractor. She said that she lost more than £4000 income due to losing her job. She said that she was on probation at the time and had to take three separate days off for boiler repairs, but the contractors did not attend.

Assessment and findings

  1. The landlord has identified that there were failings in the arrangement of repairs to the resident’s boiler. The landlord had an obligation to adhere to its repairs policy which states that an emergency repair should be attended to within three hours and completed within 24 hours. The landlord has provided limited information about the repair, but both the landlord and the resident agree that the repair was attended to on the same day that it was raised.
  2. The information provided does not show that the emergency repair was completed within 24 hours, as an appointment was scheduled for a future date, and that the landlord adhered to the timescales for emergency repairs as stated in its repairs policy. It is recognised that sometimes the parts which are required to complete a repair will not be immediately available, and in these circumstances, it is important that a resident is kept updated about the progress of the repair. This did not reasonably happen in this case, but the landlord acknowledged the inconvenience the resident experienced due to its lack of communication in its stage two response.
  3. The resident has complained that two missed appointments led to her losing her job as she had to take days off from work while in her probationary period. The landlord has acknowledged one missed appointment on 19 March. The resident has stated that she also took time off from work on 15 March but neither the landlord nor resident has provided any evidence which confirms that an appointment was confirmed for this date. The discrepancy between the landlord’s records and the resident’s version of evidence shows that there was some confusion about when the boiler repair would take place, and the landlord has acknowledged this and appropriately re-offered compensation in its stage two response.
  4. In the circumstances, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have clearly communicated to the resident when the works were due to take place and to have explained the reason for any delays. However, it was reasonable that the landlord concluded that its failings were not directly responsible for the resident losing her job. It is understood that the loss of her employment has led to a great deal of distress and inconvenience for the resident. However, decisions relating to the resident’s employment are a matter between the resident and her employer, and it would not be reasonable in this case to hold the landlord accountable for these.
  5. In line with the tenancy agreement, the resident had a responsibility to make necessary arrangements to be at home to facilitate repairs. In general, the Ombudsman would not propose a remedy of compensation to reimburse the resident for loss of earnings or employment while routine or emergency repairs were carried out. In this case, the resident was caused inconvenience because the repair appointment was missed, and the repair issue was not resolved within a reasonable timescale. It was appropriate that redress to recognise the inconvenience caused to the resident was made, without compensation for any loss of employment.
  6. The level of compensation offered by the landlord, via its contractor, was reasonable redress in recognition of the inconvenience caused to the resident by the failing to complete the repair at the initial appointment on 13 March 2021, and the missed appointment on 19 March 2021. Landlords typically offer compensation of less than £50 for missed appointments, and the amount offered in this case appropriately reflects the inconvenience that was caused to the resident by the failings identified.  The Ombudsman’s own internal guidance on calculating financial redress details that awards of £50 to £250 may be appropriate in cases where the failings have had an impact on the resident but were of short duration rather than a considerable period. The offer to the resident is in line with this.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 55(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord offered redress to the complainant prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint satisfactorily.

Reasons

  1. The landlord attended to the reported repair issue in an appropriate time frame but did not complete the repair within the timescales set out in its repairs policy. It has acknowledged and apologised for its poor service and lack of communication in resolving the repair issue and reasonable compensation has been offered in recognition of this.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord should pay the resident the £150 compensation offered at stage two.