Onward Homes Limited (202102755)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202102755

Onward Homes Limited

11 March 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 handling of a wide range of repairs to the resident’s home.

Background and summary of events

2. The resident became a secure tenant of the landlord by way of mutual exchange on 3 February 2020. The landlord is a housing association.
3. The resident has explained that she raised several repair issues with the landlord in the months following the start of her tenancy. The work was put on hold due to the various covid restrictions in place at the time. Standard repair work started to return to normal towards the end of 2020.
4. The landlord’s records show its contractor inspected the resident’s property on 9 December 2020 for various repairs which were raised at the start of her tenancy. This included the floors upstairs, shower, the flags (paving slabs) at the front door, brickwork around the front and rear doors, resealing of the windows, and replacement of stair treads. Its records show that the resident chased the outstanding repairs several times in December.
5. On 8 February 2021 the landlord contacted its contractors for an update following the property inspection, in order to schedule work orders and complete the repairs.
6. The landlord phoned the resident on 10 February 2021 to confirm repair jobs had been raised. It advised her to wait for the repair team to schedule the appointments.
7. On 16 February 2021 the resident contacted the landlord for an update. It advised that appointments had not yet been made due to the amount of works required, which needed to be planned accordingly.
8. The resident phoned the landlord again for an update on 15 March 2021. It advised that repair jobs had been raised with an intended completion timeframe of 60 days. On 29 April 2021 the resident chased the landlord, as the repairs were still outstanding, and the 60-day target was due to expire. It advised the resident to allow time for it to contact her and book the repair jobs.
9. On 5 May 2021, following contact by the resident, this Service contacted the landlord to pass on the resident’s concerns about the repairs. We explained that the resident said she had tried raising a complaint, but it had not been logged by the landlord. She said that when she moved into the property in February 2020, several repairs were needed and the landlord carried out inspections at the property. However, the repairs remained outstanding. The resident explained that the landlord had subsequently requested all works to be completed between 10 March to 10 May 2021, but she had not received any further communication from it and works had not started. The resident asked that the landlord respond to her complaint; confirm if there were further repairs to the property, such as the bathroom; and to complete all outstanding repairs in a timely manner.
10. The landlord acknowledged receipt of the resident’s complaint on 11 May 2021 and apologised for her having reason to complain. It aimed to respond within ten working days.
11. On 17 May 2021 the landlord’s contractors attended the resident’s property to complete some of the outstanding repairs. During the appointment a dispute occurred between the resident and the contractors, leading to the resident asking the contractors to leave. They later returned to make safe the repairs, but they were not given the opportunity and as a result repairs, including to parts of the stairs, were left incomplete.
12. The resident called the landlord the same day. The note of the call states that she was “very upset with [contractors]”, and that she gave an account of what had happened.
13. An internal email on 17 May 2021 refers to the resident’s report, and to what the contractors had reported. It noted that “Obviously there is two sides to this unfortunate event”, but that the work was still outstanding and needed to be finished.
14. The resident phoned this Service on 18 May 2021. She explained that the contractors had behaved unprofessionally and spoken inappropriately about her, and that she had asked them to leave. The repair work was therefore unfinished.  As result, she could not use the stairs to access the bathroom or bedroom upstairs, and had resorted to sleeping downstairs and using a bucket in the kitchen as a bathroom. She said the landlord had called to discuss the dispute and arrange an emergency repair appointment, but this went unattended.
15. The resident phoned this Service again on 19 May 2021. She said that the landlord had advised that an emergency appointment for the stairs would be attended within four hours. She said its contractor attended that day to repair her stairs, left to get some tools, but never returned. She reiterated she had no access to the bathroom upstairs because the stair treads were missing, and the stairs were unsafe. She said she had not had a response from the landlord since we wrote to it.  According to the landlord’s records it advised her that a routine repair was raised in error, instead of an emergency repair, it said a “recall job” was raised as the toilet was still leaking. (A time frame to complete the repair was not given).
16. On 20 May 2021 this Service wrote to the landlord and explained what the resident had told us on 18 and 19 May 2021.Wehighlighted the outstanding repairs and the distress and inconvenience the resident had explained she was experiencing.
17. The landlord’s records show that on 20 May 2021 an appointment was scheduled to repair and make safe the stairs, which shows as completed on 26 May 2021.
18. The landlord issued its stage one complaint response on 27 May 2021. It set out its understanding that the resident’s complaint was about the outstanding repairs. It explained the actions it had taken with the repairs, including raising the repair orders initially in February 2021, cancelling the orders due to the amount of repair work needed, and re-raising the orders in March 2021 with a 60-day timeframe. It said its contractors had initially tried unsuccessfully to contact the resident to arrange an appointment (no date was mentioned), following which an appointment was booked for 14 April 2021, to “look at the works.” The landlord explained that the contractors had subsequently attended and resolved some of the repairs (no date provided), meaning the outstanding work was to the stair flooring and tread, flags to the front of the property, all the windows needing sealing, and work to remove and re-brick near the front door.
19. The landlord referred to the dispute on 17 May 2021, noting that the resident had asked the contractors to leave. It said the contractors had been told to return to the property to complete the repair work, including making the stairs safe, but that the resident had not allowed them to do so, and had been “abusive”. It said it had subsequently raised an emergency repair order for the stairs on 20 May, followed by an urgent repair order (it did not explain the specific difference between the two work orders), and that the work was completed by 26 May. The landlord confirmed that work orders had now been raised for 12 and 13 July 2021 to complete the remaining work. It acknowledged that the time taken for the repairs was too long, and that the resident had been forced by its failure to take ownership of the repairs to make repeated efforts to seek updates. It apologised, and offered the resident £100 compensation.
20. On 17 June 2021 the resident wrote to the landlord as she was dissatisfied with its response. She repeated her concerns about the length of time taken for the repairs, and disputed whether some of the repairs had been completed as the landlord said. She further explained that the 17 May dispute was caused by the contractors making her feel uncomfortable, mocking her, and talking about in derogatory terms. She said that after her requests for them to leave were ignored, she used offensive language, which she regretted, but that she felt that was the only time her behaviour was inappropriate.
21. The landlord issued its final complaint response on 2 August 2021. It summarised much of the information it had provided about the repairs in its first complaint response. However, it said that the repair work had started as intended, but there had been difficulties contacting the resident to make the necessary arrangements, and that “there was an incident of unacceptable behaviour towards the…contractor operatives, that resulted in their departure from your home without all works having been completed as planned.” It said it had noted there were a small number of outstanding repairs (it did not specify which repairs were outstanding) and said it had arranged an inspection on 2 August 2021 to assess them. The landlord acknowledged its service failure in the length of time taken to complete repairs, apologised again, and reiterated its offer of £100 compensation. It concluded by explaining how the resident could approach the Ombudsman if she remained dissatisfied.
22. In her complaint to the Ombudsman the resident disputed some of the content of the landlord’s complaint responses, especially regarding the events of 17 May 2021. She said she had been without access to her upstairs facilities for three days. She recently advised that, as of February 2022, the repair work to the flags and front and rear door brickwork remained outstanding.

Assessment and findings

23. The landlord’s repairs policy sets out its expectations, responsibilities and timescales for completing repairs. The policy states the landlord is responsible for repairs to the structure and exterior of the resident’s property and also some repairs inside the home including floors, windows, doors, baths, toilets sinks, tap washers, switches etc. It advises five working days for urgent repairs, 20 working days for routine repairs, and within four hours for emergency repairs. It notes the expectations of its contractors is to show respect to residents and their home.
24. There are occasions when repairs cannot be resolved within a landlord’s usual timeframes. This is when there are factors which are outside the landlord’s direct control, such as the need for specialised materials or operatives, access problems, or the basic sheer scale of the issue. In these cases the measure of a landlord’s actions becomes how they communicated with and updated the resident, and the steps they took to resolve the repairs as quickly as possible.
25. In this case the landlord inspected and identified the wide range of repairs needed on 9 December 2020. It appears from its records and explanations that there was some initial effort in February 2021 to initiate the necessary repair work, but that it wasn’t until 10 March 2021 that repair orders were properly raised, with a 60-day completion timeframe (9 May 2021). Accordingly, even before the work started there was a three month delay, with no clear explanation for it, and no evidence of meaningful updates to the resident.
26. Repair work commenced in April 2021, and some of the repair issues were completed. However, the altercation on 17 May between the resident and contractors appears to have then derailed the plans. Both the resident and the contractors explained to the landlord their accounts of what happened, and both accounts differ. Nothing in the evidence indicates that there were independent witnesses, or that there is any other information available which might have allowed the landlord to determine one way, or another, which account was the more accurate. It is therefore unclear how the landlord concluded in its stage two complaint response that the resident had behaved unacceptably towards the contractors, without considering what role the contractors may have played in the incident. The landlord did not explain how it had reached that conclusion, and it should have done so given how important and distressing the resident had told it the issue was for her, and also given that the landlord implied the incident had contributed to the delays (which it said were progressing as planned until that point). It’s handling of the matter gives no indication of being fair or balanced.
27. In its second complaint response the landlord acknowledged that some repair issues remained, and it referred to a forthcoming inspection appointment in August 2021. It did not specify which repairs, but the resident has told this Service that at least two of the repairs raised in December 2020 were still outstanding as of February 2022.
28. After the 17 May 2021 incident the resident was left without access to her bedroom, bathroom and toilet. The resident explained her situation clearly to this Service at the time, and we passed on the information to the landlord promptly. It is not entirely clear what the landlord understood the consequences of the interrupted repairs to be, but it nonetheless raised the issue as an emergency repair initially, and then changed it to an urgent one, both on 20 May 2021, and it must have had some appreciation of the urgency. The resident has said that she was without access to her toilet for three days. It is not possible to ascertain clearly from the records or other evidence what actually occurred with the repairs to the stairs, but the records and the complaint response refer to a completion date of 26 May (six working days, and outside the landlord’s target of five days for urgent repairs). A resident’s inability to use the only toilet in their home due to repairs is usually considered to be an urgent problem which should be resolved within one working day (using the timeframes in the right to repair scheme as a broad guide), so even if the resident’s explanation that it took three days to resolve is correct, it was still an unreasonable amount of time.
29. In its complaint responses in May and August 2021 the landlord acknowledged that up until those points the repairs had taken too long, and that the resident had had to chase matters. It apologised, and offered £100 compensation. It did not acknowledge that some of the repairs raised in December 2020 were still outstanding, nor did it respond to the resident’s complaint about the incident on 17 May 2021, other than to refer to the resident acting abusive. The landlord also did not identify or acknowledge its failure to resolve in a reasonable timeframe the resident’s lack of access to toilet facilities.
30. Overall, the extensive repair delays, the failure to thoroughly investigate the incident between the contractors and the resident or to respond fairly and meaningfully to the resident’s complaint about it, and the failure to resolve in a reasonable timeframe the resident’s lack of toilet facilities, were significant failings by the landlord. The apologies and compensation it offered in its responses to the resident’s complaint were not proportionate to the scale of its mistakes.

Determination (decision)

31. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in respect of the complaint.

Orders

32. Within four weeks of this report the landlord must:
    1. Write to the resident confirming whether any of the original repair work referred to in this report remains outstanding, and to provide a robust short-term timeframe for completing them. If all the relevant repairs have now been completed, the landlord should write to the resident confirming so.
    2. Pay compensation to the resident of £500 for the frustration and inconvenience which will have been caused by the failings found in this report. This amount is based on the number of failings, their understandable impact, and the long time period involved.
33. This compensation is in addition to the £100 already offered to the resident by the landlord in its complaint responses, which should also now be paid if it has not already been.
34. Evidence of compliance with these orders must be provided within the relevant timeframes.