The Guinness Partnership Limited (202122166)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202122166

The Guinness Partnership Limited

20 June 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 delay to resolve a leak in the resident’s kitchen and repair the damage caused.

Background

  1. The resident is a tenant of the landlord.
  2. The resident contacted the landlord on 2 August 2021 to make a complaint about an issue with an ongoing leak in her kitchen that had occurred since late July 2021. The leak had not been resolved despite several emergency appointments attended by the landlord. The resident reported that the leak had caused a foul smell in her home from the wastepipe and that her kitchen flooring had sustained damage.
  3. The landlord issued its stage one response on 8 October 2021. It upheld the resident’s complaint, acknowledging that it had failed to resolve the leak and complete work to make the surrounding items good within a timely manner. The landlord apologised and offered the resident £300 compensation in recognition of the stress and inconvenience caused. The landlord said that the works to rectify the leak had since been completed, and agreed for its contractor to attend the resident’s home on 18 October 2021 to replace the damaged floorboards and floor covering.
  4. The resident escalated her complaint as she was dissatisfied that the landlord’s contractor failed to attend her home to replace the flooring. The landlord issued its final response on 29 November 2021. It acknowledged that its contractor had failed to attend the resident’s home as agreed on 18 October due to an unforeseen absence by one its operatives. After having made enquiries with its contractor, the landlord said it believed that these works had been completed on 26 October 2021. In light of the missed appointment and additional stress and inconvenience caused, it apologised to the resident and offered her additional compensation of £100. It confirmed its complaint process had been completed and provided the resident information for how to contact this Service if she remained dissatisfied.
  5. The resident referred her complaint to this Service in January 2022 as she said that the leak in the kitchen was still an ongoing issue. The outcome she sought was for the leak to be rectified and for the damage to be made good.

Assessment and findings

  1. There is no dispute that in this case the landlord is responsible for repairs to the resident’s pipes and similar fixtures.
  2. In her complaint to the Ombudsman in January 2022 the resident explained that the leak was ongoing. The landlord’s repair records state that the leak reported in July 2021 was repaired by 16 September 2021. The records also show that a new leak started in December 2021, which appears to relate to the work it did to redecorate following the previous leak. This leak was not part of the resident’s complaint to the landlord because it had not occurred at the time. The Housing Ombudsman Scheme states that the Ombudsman will only investigate a complaint once it has exhausted the landlord’s complaints process. Given that the leak from December has not yet been considered by the landlord, it cannot be considered in this investigation, even though it appears to be connected, at least in part, to the events following the July leak. Recommendations for the landlord have been made below in regard to this point.
  3. In relation to the July 2021 leak, the landlord did not dispute that it failed to rectify the initial leak and make good the surrounding damage within a reasonable timeframe. Accordingly, it upheld the resident’s complaint. It apologised to the resident for its service being less that it should have been. It was appropriate for the landlord to recognise its service failings, although it did not offer a clear explanation as to what had caused the delays, and good practice would have been for it to do so. Nonetheless, the landlord offered the resident £300 compensation for the distress and inconvenience caused by its delay to rectify the issue. It then offered the resident further compensation of £100 in its stage two response to apologise for its contractor’s failure to attend to replace the flooring on 18 October 2021 and appropriately explained that this was due to an unforeseen absence. The landlord said it provided feedback to its contractor in relation to keeping resident’s informed if they are unable to attend agreed appointments. Compensation was an appropriate remedy given the multiple visits to the resident’s home to progress the repairs, added to the damage caused by the leak and the foul smell that occurred at the resident’s home whilst the issue remained unresolved.
  4. Overall, the landlord’s actions to make good the damage, compensate the resident, and assurances that it had fed back learnings to the relevant staff were appropriate in the circumstances, and proportionate to the understandable distress and inconvenience experienced by the resident in relation to the July 2021 leak. The compensation offered by the landlord was also in line with the Ombudsman’s remedy guidance for a complaint where service failure has been long running, and required regular follow up by the resident, but where there is no apparent long-term impact.  For this reason, at least in the period considered in this investigation, the landlord has made redress to the resident which resolves the complaint satisfactorily.

Determination

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

Recommendations

  1. If it has not already done so, the landlord should now pay to the resident the £400 it previously offered. The determination in this report is partly based on that offer.
  2. The landlord should consider contacting the resident to discuss the leak referred to in paragraph 8 and consider any complaint she wishes to make about the matter. If a complaint is raised, the landlord should deal with it accordingly through its complaints process, and the resident will be able to return to the Ombudsman if she remains dissatisfied once the landlord’s investigations are complete.