Southern Housing Group Limited (202206951)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202206951

Southern Housing Group Limited

17 November 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

The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of:
1. The resident’s reports that her dishwasher and computer had been damaged as a result of electrical testing completed at the property.
2. The associated complaint.

Background

The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord.
Following electrical testing that occurred on 21 January 2022, the resident contacted the landlord to inform it that her dishwasher and computer had been damaged. The electrician attended the following day to assess the damage and agreed to replace the dishwasher. The landlord advised the computer was not at the property during the visit for it to be able to assess any damage, and therefore said it was not liable for the damage to this item. Following delays, the landlord advised the resident that it would contact her to book an appointment to install the replacement dishwasher after she had returned from her holiday in mid-August 2022. It advised it was not liable for damages to the computer as there was no evidence to support it was damaged during the electrical testing.
The resident’s complained about the landlord’s decision not to reimburse for the damaged computer, despite the resident providing a report from a third-party company that had assessed the computer. She was also dissatisfied with the delays in the landlord replacing the dishwasher, and the poor communication she received from the landlord. The resident wanted to be reimbursed for the damaged computer, the cost of the private investigation of the computer damage and compensation for distress and inconvenience caused by the delays.
In the landlord’s response to the complaint, it apologised for its delays in handling the resident’s complaint, and for the delays in replacing the dishwasher. It advised there was not enough evidence to suggest that the electrical testing had caused damage to the resident’s computer. It offered £125 compensation which was made up of:
1. £50 for the delay in replacing the dishwasher,
2. £25 for the delays in its handling of the complaint and,
3. £50 as a gesture of goodwill.
The resident remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response as she believed the landlord was liable for the damage to the computer and she had provided evidence to support this. The resident is seeking £1160.40 for the damaged computer, £265 for the cost of the investigation of the damage, £1000 for emotional and behavioural damages caused to her son as it has stopped him becoming a Youtuber, and affected his education.

Assessment and findings

Policies and Procedures

The tenancy agreement states that residents are strongly advised to take out contents insurance in order to protect themselves in the event of any loss or damage to the contents in their home.
The landlord’s complaints policy states that initially, if a resident is unhappy, it will be raised as ‘service dissatisfaction’, and if the issue is not resolved in 10 working days, the resident will be able to escalate the issue to stage one of the landlord’s complaints process. It states that a stage one response will be provided within 10 working days, and a stage two complaint will be responded to within twenty working days. It states that at both stages, if a response is not possible within the timeframes given, it will inform the resident of the reason, and a date when the resident can expect the response, but that this will not exceed a further 10 working days.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports that her dishwasher and computer had been damaged as a result of electrical testing completed at the property.

In this case, the landlord acknowledged that there were delays in it providing the resident with a replacement dishwasher, which it had agreed it was liable for. It apologised for the delays in providing the replacement dishwasher, and in recognition of this, offered the resident £50 compensation.
Whilst the landlord has disputed that it is liable for the damaged computer due to a lack of evidence, the resident believes it is liable, and has stated that further evidence was provided. The landlord did not provide compensation for the computer, but did offer the resident £50 as a goodwill gesture. It also showed some learning in relation to the delays throughout the replacement of the dishwasher, as it advised it will work with the contractors to improve its practices and the services it delivers.
Therefore, the role of this Service is to determine whether the landlord provided adequate redress for its acknowledged failings, and to assess whether the landlord was fair in its approach of the resident’s reports of a damaged computer, in line with Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles: to be fair, put things right and learn from outcomes.
Following the resident’s reports of the damage on 21 January 2022, the landlord acted appropriately and arranged for a contractor to attend the following day and investigate the cause of the damage, and identify any issues with the electrical circuits at the property. The contractor advised that when the operative attended the property, the computer was not there and therefore they were unable to investigate any damage, and determine liability. The resident has advised that she had taken the computer to a repair company to investigate the damage.
In addition, the resident provided the landlord with the report from the third-party company who had assessed the computer. The report advised there was issues with the motherboard of the computer, and stated “that it is indeed possible for electrical testing to damage electrical goods if they are not disconnected before testing commences.” Whilst this Service acknowledges that the resident had taken further steps to provide the landlord with evidence of the damage, it was reasonable that the landlord believed it could not determine what had caused the damage as the third-party’s statement was a general statement, and did not specifically relate to the cause of the damage for the computer. Furthermore, the landlord has advised that the electrician who attended was working on the electrical circuit which supplied the dishwasher, but that the computer was supplied from an alternative circuit.
Likewise, whilst this Service acknowledges that the resident had paid for this investigation which had cost £265, this does not mean that the landlord would be obliged to reimburse the cost. The landlord had arranged for its own investigation to take place in a timely manner, and whilst it was unfortunate that the computer was not at the property at the time, this was outside of the landlord’s control. There is no evidence that the resident made the landlord aware in advance that she would be arranging an investigation by a third party or that the landlord agreed to pay for this.
Furthermore, the landlord had advised the resident that any damages to personal belongings should be claimed on her contents insurance, which the resident has advised she does not have. Although tenants are not strictly obliged to have contents insurance, the tenancy agreement states that residents are recommended to take out a contents insurance policy to provide cover in the event of any loss or damage to the contents in their home. Whilst this Service acknowledges that this situation is frustrating for the resident, the landlord would not be expected to compensate her as an alternative to having contents insurance.
Ultimately, the landlord had acted reasonably in its handling of the computer claim, and its decision not to reimburse the costs of the computer and costs for the third-party to assess the computer was fair. The landlord had offered a goodwill gesture of £50 although it was not strictly obliged to offer any compensation for this issue.
However, when considering the time taken for the landlord to provide the resident with a replacement dishwasher (a total of eight months), the £50 compensation provided in view of the delays was not proportionate. Especially when considering additional factors in the case, such as the landlord’s poor communication. Whilst the landlord’s repairs policy does not give a specific timeframe for routine repairs, the industry standard is for routine repairs to be completed within 28 days. It should be noted that in some cases, parts may need to be ordered and therefore this may take longer. However, in such circumstances, a landlord would be expected to keep the resident updated and explain the reasons for any delays, which did not happen in this case. The resident regularly had to chase for updates on both aspects of the damage (the dishwasher and the claim for the computer), and was often told that there was no update available. This is evidence of both poor communication and poor record-keeping from the landlord. The landlord would have been expected to maintain an accurate and clear record of any remedial work in the resident’s property, and therefore should have been able to provide the resident with regular updates.
Similarly, despite the resident being told on 28 February 2022 that the replacement dishwasher had been ordered, it is clear that this was not the case as in April 2022 the landlord asked the resident for details of the current dishwasher, and on 27 July 2022 the landlord advised the resident that it would be providing a smaller dishwasher due to the size of the gap available for the appliance. It is not appropriate that the resident was provided with misinformation throughout this case, and due to this, the landlord had failed to appropriately set the resident’s expectations.
Overall, whilst the landlord had acted fairly in its decision to not reimburse the computer, and had agreed to replace the dishwasher for the resident, the £100 compensation offered to the resident was not proportionate when considering the extent of the delays, the misinformation provided to the resident, the landlord’s poor record-keeping and its poor communication throughout.
This service’s Remedies Guidance (published on our website) sets out our approach to compensation for distress and inconvenience. The Remedies Guidance suggests that the Ombudsman may award compensation of £100 to £600 for cases where a landlord has acknowledged failings, and made some attempt to put things right but failed to address the detriment to the resident and/or where the offer was not proportionate to the failings identified by our investigation. Therefore, it is the opinion of this Service that compensation of £200 would provide adequate redress for the failings identified above.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint

The landlord had also acknowledged the delays in its handling of the resident’s complaint, and had offered the resident £25 compensation in view of this. Therefore, it is the role of this Service to assess whether this compensation is proportionate to the delays, and the impact this had on the resident.
The resident escalated her complaint from the landlord’s ‘service dissatisfaction’ stage to stage one of the formal complaints process on 09 February 2022 as the landlord had been unable to resolve the issue within the ten working day timeframe listed in its complaints policy. The landlord acted appropriately by acknowledging the complaint within one working day, on 10 February 2022. The use of a ‘service dissatisfaction’ stage could be seen as having a third stage in the landlord’s complaints process. The Ombudsman’s approach to complaint handling is set out in our Complaint Handling Code (published on our website). In line with the code, the Ombudsman does not believe a third stage is necessary as part of the complaints process, but if a landlord strongly believes it requires one, it should set out its reasons in its complaints policy. The landlord has outlined its reasoning for this ‘third’ stage within its complaints policy, which is mainly being to try and resolve any issues informally before a complaint is escalated further. It may be helpful for the landlord to consider whether this is a necessary step, or whether it delays residents from being able to raise a formal complaint when they wish to do so.
Following this, the landlord provided its stage one complaint response on 28 February 2022, which was a total of 13 working days. This was slightly outside of the timeframe as listed in the landlord’s complaints policy, which states a stage one response would be provided within 10 working days but overall a delay of three days would not have had a significant impact.
The resident requested to escalate her complaint on four different occasions (14 March 2022, 19 April 2022, 05 May 2022, and 27 May 2022), and the landlord failed to acknowledged the escalation on the first three occasions. The landlord did acknowledge in its stage two complaint response that it should have acknowledged the complaint at an earlier stage, yet stated that the resident requested to escalate the complaint on 10 June 2022, and this was not logged as a stage two complaint until 4 July 2022. This is evidence of the landlord’s poor record-keeping, and also shows that it had provided the resident with misinformation. From the evidence provided to this Service, it is evident that the resident did chase her complaint on 10 June 2022, but this was not the initial escalation request. Therefore, the landlord’s poor record-keeping and poor communication led to a further delay in the escalation of the complaint of 75 working days.
In addition, the landlord advised the resident in the stage two response that the complaint was not logged as a stage two complaint until 4 July, and was not escalated until 10 June 2022. However, the landlord had provided an acknowledgement of the stage two complaint on 27 May 2022, and therefore, this is further evidence of the landlord’s poor record-keeping. Although we were still able to determine this case using the information that was available, it is vital that landlords keep clear, accurate and easily accessible records to provide an audit trail. If we investigate a complaint, we will ask for the landlord’s records. If there is disputed evidence and no audit trail, we may not be able to conclude that an action took place or that the landlord followed its own policies and procedures. It is therefore recommended that the landlord conduct a review of its record keeping processes, ensuring that there is a clear audit trail for complaints, which provides details of specifically when contact was made, what was said and what the agreed next steps and expectations were.
Furthermore, the landlord provided a holding response on 18 July 2022, before providing the stage two response on 28 July 2022. Therefore, in total, the landlord had taken 93 working days to response to the resident’s stage two complaint, from the point of the resident’s initial escalation request. This significantly exceeded the appropriate timeframe for a stage two response, as listed in the landlord’s complaints policy and the landlord has not provided an adequate explanation for the delay. Throughout the complaints process, the resident regularly had to chase a response to her complaint, and this is further evidence of the landlord’s poor communication.
When considering the above factors, the £25 compensation offered to the resident is not proportionate. In line with the Ombudsman’s Remedies Guidance, as set out above, the landlord should pay the resident a further £225 for poor complaint handling, bringing the total compensation for this issue to £250.

Determination

In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in way the landlord handled the resident’s reports that her dishwasher and computer had been damaged as a result of electrical testing completed at the property.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in way the landlord handled the associated complaint.

Orders

The landlord is ordered to pay the resident £450 compensation, which is inclusive of the £125 previously offered, if this has not yet been paid. This is made up of:
1. £50 goodwill gesture previously offered,
2. £100 for its delays in providing the replacement dishwasher,
3. £50 for its poor record-keeping,
4. £150 for its delays in handling the associated complaint and,
5. £100 for its poor communication.
This should be paid within four weeks of the date of this letter.

Recommendations

It is recommended that the landlord;
1. the landlord reviews its record-keeping processes to avoid similar situations occurring in the future, and considers providing additional staff training in the importance of keeping accurate and clear records.
2. consider providing further staff training on the importance of communicating with residents, and ensuring the information provided is accurate.
3. reviews its complaints policy, and considers whether there is a necessity for its ‘Service Dissatisfaction’ stage, or whether the policy could be improved by shortening its complaints process to two stages as recommended in the Complaint Handling Code provided by this Service.