Paragon Asra Housing Limited (202318241)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202318241

Paragon Asra Housing Limited

18 June 2025

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 concerns about her service charges.
2. The Ombudsman has also considered the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

3. The resident is a joint, assured tenant of the landlord, and the tenancy began on 13 July 2022. The property is a 2-bedroom bungalow situated within a housing scheme for those over the age of 55. The scheme consists of 20 flats within a block and 7bungalows. The landlord has advised it had no recorded vulnerabilities for the resident.
4. The resident first contacted the Ombudsman in August 2023, she stated that she had tried to contact the landlord about her service charges, but it had not responded. Her complaint was that she was paying for services that she did not receive or have access to. The resident said a formal complaint was raised over the phone in March 2023, but she had not received anything in writing from the landlord. The Ombudsman wrote to the landlord on 17 October 2023 and requested it provide the resident with a response to her complaint.
5. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 1 November 2023. This included:
   1. It said that the bungalows the resident lived in benefited from the same services as the larger block, including, bulk rubbish removal, cleaning and tree surgery.
   2. It said the bungalows and flats formed the same scheme, so the charges were applied across the scheme.
   3. It apologised that the resident’s queries had not been answered previously and acknowledged the frustration this would have caused.
   4. It upheld the resident’s complaint about its communication but advised the service charge was correct.
6. The resident escalated her complaint on 6 November 2023. The resident detailed 8 separate charges which did not serve her property, these included:
   1. “Provision for Use”.
   2. “Grounds Maintenance Contract”.
   3. “Bulk Rubbish Removal”.
   4. “Gritting/Salting”.
   5. “Cleaning out of Contract”.
   6. “Tree Surgery & Additional Gardening”.
   7. “Staff Costs”.
   8. “Other Communal Scheme Costs”.
7. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 28 December 2023. This included:
   1. It apologised for its delayed response and offered £20 compensation.
   2. It said the lease/tenancy agreements were written in such a way that all elements were divided equally and there was no bearing on whether residents benefited from those services.
   3. It provided its position on the 8 services referenced by the resident and agreed the following would be removed:
      1. Provision for use.
      2. Bulk rubbish removal.
      3. Gritting/salting.
      4. Cleaning out of contract.
8. On 29 December 2023, the resident queried whether she would be refunded the 18 months of charges she has already paid and raised further clarification points. The landlord communicated its position on the resident’s queries in January 2024 and confirmed it had backdated the charges to her account.
9. On 25 June 2024, the resident confirmed to the Ombudsman that her complaint was about being charged for services she had not received or that she did not have access to. The resident advises the ground maintenance and staff costs query remained unresolved.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

10. Paragraph 42(d) of the Scheme says the Ombudsman may not consider complaints which concern the level of rent or service charge, or the amount of the rent or service charge increases. While the Ombudsman can consider how the landlord handled the resident’s complaint about service charges, it does not have the jurisdiction to consider whether the service charges or the increases were reasonable, as that would be a matter for the First Tier Tribunal. The resident may wish to seek independent legal advice on this matter.

Service charges

11. The tenancy agreement states the landlord can charge the resident for the services it provides. It applies a fixed service charge for numerous services as detailed in the tenancy agreement. It is acknowledged, when asked for information for this investigation, the landlord provided a draft service charge policy from January 2024. Although this is dated after the resident’s complaint, it notes that certain services are provided across a scheme or estate as a whole, which is reflected in the service charge.
12. The resident said she had tried to raise her concerns with the landlord before she approached the Ombudsman in August 2023. The landlord provided some internal emails from early October 2023 discussing the charges across the scheme. From the records provided it is not clear what communications the landlord directly had with the resident before recording the complaint.
13. The landlord should have systems in place to maintain accurate records of customer interactions, especially those interactions where decisions are made or actions agreed. Good record keeping is vital to evidence the action a landlord has taken and failure to keep adequate records indicates that the landlord’s processes are not operating effectively. Staff should be aware of a landlord’s record management policy and procedures and adhere to these.
14. Within its stage 1 response, the landlord acknowledged the resident’s complaint being about the charges applied to her property despite the bungalows being separate from the main scheme. Its response to this in its stage 1 response was perplexing, it said that the flats and bungalows were set up as a whole scheme and you had to drive through the bungalows to enter the flat block. More reasonably it said the bungalows benefited from the same services as the flats, such as rubbish removal, cleaning and tree surgery. However, in its stage 2 response, it agreed to remove the rubbish removal and cleaning charge from the bungalows, demonstrating an inadequate level of investigation at stage 1 of its process.
15. Within its stage 2 response, the landlord detailed that the lease agreement for the scheme said, “to contribute and pay one equal twenty-seventh part of the costs and expenses”. It is not clear which lease agreement the landlord refers to here, the resident’s tenancy agreement does not feature this level of detail. In addition, the landlord also confirmed in this response that some of the charges were not distributed equally, dependent on the level of service. This is a contradiction of statements made by the landlord. It is understandable that the resident wished to query her charges further following this response. It is noted the landlord acknowledged that the split of charges may not have been explained fully at the start of the tenancy, a recommendation has therefore been made for the landlord to consider this in the future.
16. The landlord acted reasonably in its stage 2 investigation, it demonstrated it listened to the resident’s concerns, detailed the specific service charges and agreed to remove some of the charges due to the level of service. Following its stage 2 response, the landlord also advised it had backdated a refund of these charges for the resident, which was also reasonable.
17. In addition to the above, the landlord acknowledged the resident’s complaint about its communication and apologised that it had not answered the resident queries sooner. It upheld this part of the resident’s complaint and said it was an area it needed to improve. Due to the lack of records provided, the Ombudsman has been unable to determine if the landlord adequately investigated its service failure and could be confident that it could be avoided in the future. A recommendation has therefore been made for the landlord to consider this.
18. In conducting investigations, the Ombudsman relies on contemporaneous documentary evidence to ascertain what events took place and reach conclusions on whether the landlord’s actions were reasonable in all the circumstances of the case. Overall, the landlord’s response was reasonable. The landlord has however failed to provide for this investigation, adequate records of its actions and its interactions with the resident throughout which is a failing. An accurate audit trail is a crucial part of a landlord’s service delivery. The Ombudsman is unable to conclude that the landlord communicated in an appropriate manner with the resident at the time. This has also prevented the Ombudsman from determining whether the alleged time and trouble spent by the resident was extensive and therefore likely to cause further inconvenience to the resident. This equates to service failure by the landlord. Along with an order to compensate the resident, a recommendation has been made regarding the landlord’s record keeping.

Complaint

19. The landlord’s complaint policy, states that it operates a 2-stage complaint process. It states that at stage 1, it will agree a resolution with the resident within 10 working days. If the resident escalates a complaint to stage 2, then a response will be provided within 20 working days. At both stage 1 and stage 2, the policy states that if the complaint is particularly complex, the landlord may need longer than the prescribed timescales to resolve it. In these instances, it says the resident will be kept informed and regularly updated on the reasons for this.
20. In communication with the Ombudsman in August 2023, the resident said she had made a formal complaint in March 2023. The landlord did not provide any records of its interactions with the resident prior to it raising a stage 1 complaint which is not reasonable. However, the landlord acknowledged and apologised for its poor communications in its stage 1 response.
21. After it recorded a complaint, following the Ombudsman’s communication on 17 October 2023, the landlord responded in 11 working days. The landlord acknowledged the residents request to escalate her complaint to stage 2 on 6 November 2023. It provided its response on 28 December 2023, 35 days after the escalation acknowledgement and 15 working days outside of its policy timescale. In addition, the Ombudsman had to intervene and request the landlord provide a response to the resident at each stage of her complaint.
22. Although the landlord acknowledged its delay in providing a stage 2 response and offered £20 compensation, it gave no reason for the delay which is not reasonable. The landlord also failed to investigate why the resident had to seek the assistance of the Ombudsman for the landlord to respond to her concerns. Overall, the landlord failed to demonstrate its learning from its acknowledged service failure in its handling of the resident’s complaint.
23. When a landlord acknowledges that something went wrong, the Ombudsman would expect the landlord to put things right and offer a proportionate level of redress for the circumstances of the case. The landlord offered the resident a total of £20 for the delay. An amount of £100 has been ordered to reflect the time and trouble by the resident spent pursuing her complaint with the Ombudsman and the landlord. This amount is in line with our remedies guidance, where a landlord has made some attempt to put things right but failed to address the detriment to the resident and the offer was not proportionate to the failings identified.

Determination

24. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in relation to its response to the resident’s concerns about her service charges.
25. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in relation to its handling of the resident’s complaint.

Orders

26. The landlord is ordered within 4 weeks of this report to:
    1. Write to the resident to apologise for the failings identified in this report.
    2. Pay the resident a total of £150 compensation, comprised of:
    3. £50 for its service failure identified in relation to the landlord’s record keeping.
    4. £100 for its failures identified in its complaint handling.
27. This compensation replaces the landlord’s previous offer of £20. The landlord must pay this compensation directly to the resident and not apply it to her rent account or similar, unless the resident requests this. If the landlord has paid its previously offered compensation of £20, or any part of it, it may deduct this from the amount ordered above.
28. As part of case 202323154, the landlord was asked to carry out a review of its complaints process in order to improve its overall timescales to respond, its communication with residents about any delays and how it captures any learning from complaints. As such, and in view of the date of this complaint in comparison to the above-mentioned case, the Ombudsman will not make any orders that may duplicate what has already been asked of the landlord. The landlord is encouraged to consider the learning in this case alongside the above.

Recommendations

29. It is recommended the landlord consider key messages that need to be delivered during the signing of a tenancy, with particular emphasis on the apportionment of service charges and how it communicates and records these.
30. It is recommended the landlord review the early communications by the resident in this case to identify any potential learning.
31. The landlord should consider its record keeping practises and ensure all records are provided to the Ombudsman when required.