London & Quadrant Housing Trust (L&Q) (202219689)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202219689

London & Quadrant Housing Trust

26 September 2023

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 regarding the landlord’s;
   1. Handling of repairs to the resident’s shower panel.
   2. Complaints handling.

Background

2. The resident has occupied the property since June 2016 under an assured tenancy.
3. The resident contacted the landlord in December 2021 to advise of a repair required to her shower panel, namely water leaking from under it. The landlord made an appointment for 13 January 2022, which was rearranged by the resident to the 18 February 2022, this was again rearranged by the resident. The appointment was rescheduled for 7 April 2022.
4. The resident contacted the landlord on 11 April 2022 to advise that an operative had not turned up to her scheduled appointment time and she had then been contacted that afternoon to advise the appointment was being rescheduled. She made a formal complaint. The landlord responded to this complaint, apologising and offering £140 compensation. The resident accepted this and did not escalate the complaint to stage two.
5. The resident contacted the landlord on 20 June 2022 advising that her rescheduled appointment had again been cancelled and rearranged for 9 August 2022 due to staff sickness.
6. The landlord provided its stage one response on 20 June 2022. It stated that since March, the covid pandemic had limited the work it could do and government guidelines restricted it to carrying out only emergency repairs, as such there was a backlog it was currently working through. It advised that the earliest possible appointment was 9 August 2022 and apologised for the inconvenience this had caused.
7. The resident requested the complaint be escalated to stage two on 20 June 2022 as the stage one response had failed to address any of her raised points. She asked why the appointment had been changed without her knowledge, why she received a confirmation text then a few hours later a new appointment date, when the landlord became aware of the staff sickness, why the landlord had not taken into consideration that she had taken time off work for the appointment and why the landlord had not arranged for another operative to cover the work.
8. The resident submitted a housing disrepair letter of claim to the landlord on 7 October 2022, listing the shower panel leaking, along with a number of other repairs issues which do not form part of this complaint.
9. The landlord provided its stage two response on 19 October 2022, after the resident had repeatedly chased said response. The landlord apologised for the delay in the response and the resident feeling like she had not been treated with respect or care. The landlord went on to state that it was “unable to address in detail the contents of [the resident’s] case as this is now a legal matter and in accordance with [the landlord’s] complaints policy, any legal decision would supersede any decision made at stage two.” It acknowledged the frustration and inconvenience caused by the delay in repairs and also the distress missed appointments will have caused. It stated this was a clear service failure and offered £100 compensation. It offered a further £40 for delays at stage two and £100 for time, effort, distress and inconvenience.
10. The resident remains dissatisfied with the landlord’s response. By way of resolution, she would like the compensation payment of £240 paid and the outstanding repairs to be completed.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

11. The resident made an initial complaint regarding the appointment on 7 April 2022 being rescheduled. This was resolved at stage one. The Ombudsman will only consider complaints that have exhausted a landlord’s complaints procedure without a resolution being agreed. As this initial complaint was resolved at stage one this investigation will only consider actions that have taken place since the resolution of that cancellation on 7 April 2022.

The landlord’s handling of repairs to the resident’s shower panel

12. This service is aware that the reason for the water leakage was identified as a faulty seal. The landlord’s repairs policy states it is responsible for repairs to “shower screens” along with “silicone sealant around baths and showers”. As such this service would expect the landlord to appropriately fix the faulty shower screen seal.
13. The landlord cancelled a further appointment on 20 June 2022 due to staff sickness and rearranged this to 9 August 2022. This rearranged appointment was also cancelled, again due to staff sickness and rearranged for 26 September 2022. Once again this appointment was cancelled, this time due to a lack of materials and rearranged to 18 October 2022.
14. It is not always possible for pre-arranged appointments to be kept, but in such cases, the Ombudsman expects the landlord to take a proactive approach to communicating this to residents and agreeing on alternative arrangements. Pre-arranged appointments were not attended by the landlord on 20 June 2022, 9 August 2022 and 26 September 2022. It would have been courteous of the landlord to have given the resident reasonable notice before cancelling the appointments however some were cancelled less than 24 hours prior to the scheduled time.
15. Regarding the appointment scheduled for 20 June 2022, the landlord attempted to contact the resident to explain that the appointment had been postponed until 09 August 2022 due to staff sickness. In it stage one response it apologised for the inconvenience this had caused and advised that it could not provide an earlier appointment due to a build up of outstanding repairs caused by the covid pandemic.
16. Regarding the appointment scheduled for 9 August 2022, the resident was contacted the morning of and advised that the appointment had been cancelled, again due to staff sickness. When she brought her concerns to the attention of the landlord it apologised and advised that this would be added to her stage two complaint. This service has seen no evidence to suggest the resident was provided with a rescheduled appointment until 12 September 2022 when she was advised the appointment would go ahead on 26 September 2022. It would have been appropriate for the landlord to have been more proactive, given the circumstance.
17. Regarding the appointment scheduled for 26 September 2022, the resident was contacted the morning of and advised that the appointment had been cancelled as the materials required had not been delivered. When queried, the landlord was unable to provide a reasoning as to why the materials were not available.
18. The landlord finally attended the property on 18 October 2022 and completed the repair.
19. The landlord’s repairs policy states routine day-to-day repairs will be completed at the earliest mutually convenient time. It does not provide any specific detail on the timescales it usually works to. The Ombudsman is aware, nonetheless, that the industry standard for non emergency/non-urgent repairs is a timeframe of 28 calendar days where no specialist parts are required.
20. This service acknowledges that the first two appointments made to conduct the repairs were rearranged at the request of the resident. As such this service will consider the time taken between the first appointment cancelled by the landlord on the 7 April 2022 and the repair completion appointment on 18 October 2022.
21. The repair was completed 194 calendar days following the first cancelled appointment. This is not in line with industry standards and is a service failure.
22. The landlord’s compensation policy states “we will make a payment of £20 for a failure to keep an appointment without at least 24 hours notice”.
23. At stage two the landlord acknowledged the frustration and inconvenience caused by the length of time the resident had to wait for the repairs to begin. It apologised for the missed appointments and stated “this is a clear service failure”. It offered £100 for this service failure. It also offered £100 for the time, effort, distress and inconvenience experienced by the resident.
24. This would have been a proportionate offer of redress for the missed appointments and the distress and inconvenience caused. However the resident has made this service aware that the repair completed on 18 October 2022 did not resolve the escaping water and the landlord has not returned to complete any further works. As the repair is ongoing this Service is not satisfied that the issue was put right, in line with the Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles.

The landlord’s complaints handling

25. The landlord’s complaints policy states that at stage two the complaint will be responded to within 20 working days. Despite this, after progressing the complaint to stage two on 20 June 2022, the landlord provided its stage two response on 19 October 2022, 86 working days later.
26. The Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code is a guidance document which sets out the Ombudsman’s expectations for how landlords should handle complaints. It states landlords must respond to a stage two complaint within 20 working days, with any delays communicated and not exceeding an additional ten working days without good reason.
27. This service has seen no evidence to suggest the resident was made aware of any delay in the stage two complaint response until 8 September 2022 when the resident was advised an investigation would be completed within 20 working days. This is not in line with the landlords complaints policy or the Complaint Handling Code.
28. The resident contacted the landlord numerous times requesting an update on the stage two complaint. Had the landlord explained the delay and provided the resident with a timeframe for response, this would have saved the resident a lot of time and trouble chasing a response, as well as showing the resident that the complaint was being taken seriously and her concerns were being treated fairly.
29. The Complaint Handling Code states “A complaint response must be sent to the resident when the answer to the complaint is known, not when the outstanding actions required to address the issue, are completed. Outstanding actions must still be tracked and actioned expeditiously with regular updates provided to the resident.”.
30. On 7 October 2022 the landlord advised the resident that she would not receive a stage two response on 6 October 2022 as previously promised. It stated this was because it wanted to keep the complaint open to ensure the repair was completed on 18 October 2022 before providing a response. This is not in line with the Complaint Handling Code and further extended the delay in resolving the issue for the resident.
31. Moreover, in its stage two response the landlord stated it was “unable to address in detail the contents of [the resident’s] case as this is now a legal matter and in accordance with [the landlord’s] complaints policy, any legal decision would supersede any decision made at stage two”.
32. The Complaint Handling Code states the landlord’s complaints policy must “clearly set out the circumstances in which a matter will not be considered” it provides the following example “Legal proceedings have started. This is defined as details of the claim, such as the Claim Form and Particulars of Claim, having been filed at court”.
33. This service requested evidence of any legal proceedings that occurred during the internal complaints process. The landlord advised that the claim was not issued in court and the complaint response was referencing the fact that there was a legal disrepair case. The Ombudsman acknowledges that the landlord did state that it is now aware that it’s policy regarding concurrent complaints is not in line with the policy of this service, as stated above.
34. As such it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have addressed the repairs issue in full during its stage two complaint. This would have given the resident more trust in the landlord’s response and allowed her to feel as if her complaint had bene taken seriously. It may also have allowed the complaint to be resolved without the need for the Ombudsman’s intervention. In the Ombudsman’s opinion, the landlord missed an opportunity to fully recognise its repair failures and the adverse impact it had on the resident. As noted in the landlord’s later inspection report, there were several issues which it should have seen to upon becoming aware of the issue, in line with the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, but that it failed to. There was subsequently maladministration in its handling of this complaint.

Determination

35. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of repairs to the resident’s shower panel.
36. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s complaints handling.

Orders

37. Within four weeks of the date of this determination, the landlord is:
    1. To pay the resident £550 comprised of;
       1. £350,  inclusive of the £200 offered at stage two, in recognition of the landlord’s failure in handling the repairs to the resident’s shower panel.
       2. £200, inclusive of the £40 offered at stage two, in recognition of the landlord’s complaints handling failures.
    2. To arrange an appointment with the resident to have the shower panel fixed to an appropriate standard that no longer allows water to escape.
38. Within 12 weeks of the date of this determination, the landlord is to arrange a post-works inspection of the shower panel to ensure the works have been completed to an appropriate standard.
39. Within the above stated timeframes the landlord is to provide the Ombudsman with evidence of compliance with these orders.