The Guinness Partnership Limited (202217512)

Back to Top

 

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202217512

The Guinness Partnership Limited

29 June 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 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 time taken by the landlord to restore the resident’s communal lift to full working order following a leak.

Background

  1. The resident is a tenant of the landlord of a flat in a block, which has one communal lift accessing all floors. He reports that he and the other residents of the block are elderly, and that many of them are vulnerable.
  2. The landlord’s engineer attended the resident’s block on 22 September 2022, following a report of a roof repair on the same day from another member of its staff, to find that rainwater had leaked from the roof into the communal lift shaft. The lift was placed out of service for all residents’ safety while repairs to the roof could be completed. The landlord’s roofers then attended on 23 and 26 September 2022, when they identified the source of the leak coming from the roof and that scaffolding was needed to repair this.
  3. The resident subsequently raised a stage one complaint with the landlord on 30 September 2022 because the lift remained out of service. He said that this had resulted in several vulnerable tenants being stuck in their flats, and in others struggling to leave and access their properties via the stairs, including the ambulance service to attend a heart attack victim. The resident was frustrated that the landlord had not restored the lift to service within 48 hours, and he wanted to know what contingency plans were in place should such an event happen again. The resident was also dissatisfied that the landlord did not erect scaffolding when its roofers had come out earlier to repair the roof. Its records stated that the roof was then repaired, and that the lift was restored to full working order, on 3 October 2022.
  4. The landlord issued its stage one complaint response on 14 October 2022, which did not uphold the resident’s complaint. With regard to the lift repair, it explained that it had attended this on the same day that water in the lift was reported on 22 September 2022, and that, after this found that the leak was coming from the roof, its roofers attended on 23 and 26 September 2022 to assess this and identify that scaffolding was needed to repair the roof. The landlord outlined that its lift repairs aimed to be timely, but could sometimes take longer than expected, and that roof repairs could take up to 20 working days, which it minimised to just over a week while the lift was out of service to ensure safety due to water reaching the electrics.
  5. The landlord further stated that it had provided information explaining that the lift was out of service for residents’ safety while repairs to the roof were carried out. It also said that all residents had received a letter on how to contact it should they require assistance, with notices on all floors stating that the lift was out of service, as part of its contingency plans. The landlord outlined that impact assessments, including personal emergency evacuation plans and person-centred fire risk assessments, were done for its vulnerable residents but that, due to data protection laws, it could not provide the resident with this information for its other individual residents.
  6. The resident escalated his complaint on 17 October 2022 as he was unhappy that his complaint was not upheld, and with the length of time that the lift remained out of service. He remained concerned that the landlord did not include contingency plans for residents on the first and second floors of the building, believing that it had placed vulnerable tenants at risk.
  7. The landlord issued its final stage complaint response on 24 October 2022. It partially upheld the resident’s complaint, upholding its stage one response but adding that, had it given more information when booking the repairs to the roof on 22 September 2022, its contractors may have been able to identify the source of the leak sooner.
  8. As the landlord only initially reported that a roof repair was needed and not the location or that the communal lift was affected, it found that it could have identified the leak and that scaffolding was needed to repair this earlier than 26 September 2022. It apologised to the resident for this and explained that it had therefore provided specific feedback to improve its record keeping and ensure that as much information was possible was included when registering repairs to prevent this from recurring in the future.
  9. The resident then complained to this Service that his complaint was not fully upheld. As an outcome, he wished to be shown the contingency plans that the landlord had in place when the communal lift broke down, and he requested compensation from it for the period that the lift could not be operated. The resident added that he was dissatisfied with the landlord’s removal of fire extinguishers from his block for three days before replacing them, subsequent issues with the communal lift, and that the 24-hour warden service that the block was advertised as having when he moved there in 2018 was only provided for 20 hours.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. It is concerning that the resident has complained that the landlord removed the fire extinguishers from his block for three days, that there were further issues with the communal lift, and that it did not provide the full warden service that it had advertised to him in 2018. However, these matters are outside of the scope of this investigation to consider. This is in accordance with the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, which states that this Service may not consider complaints that are made prior to having exhausted the landlord’s complaints procedure, and there is no evidence that any complaints from the resident about these issues have done so yet.
  2. Moreover, the Housing Ombudsman Scheme also states that this Service may not consider complaints that were not brought to our attention normally more than 12 months after they exhausted the landlord’s complaints procedure, and the resident informed us in 2023 about how it had advertised its warden service to him in 2018.

Assessment

  1. In accordance with its responsive repairs policy, the landlord is required to respond to emergency repairs within 24 hours, and to either complete these or make safe the repairs before returning within a reasonable timeframe to complete them. Emergency repairs include lifts not working that are the only lift serving all floors of the building, and leaks that cannot be contained or cause a risk of electric shock, while routine repairs are those that are not emergencies and are to be completed within 28 calendar days.
  2. The landlord initially attended the resident’s communal lift as an emergency repair within 24 hours by doing so on the same day in response to its staff member’s report of a roof repair on 22 September 2022. As it discovered that water had poured into the lift shaft and electronics, it temporarily decommissioned the lift over safety concerns. This was in line with the landlord’s responsive repairs policy, as it attended within 24 hours of an emergency repair to a lift not working that was the only lift serving all floors of the building, causing a risk of electric shock, and made this safe by placing the lift out of order.
  3. The landlord did so while the roof leak repairs could be addressed, which alone appeared to be routine repairs due within 28 calendar days under its responsive repairs policy, as the leak did not appear to be uncontainable. Therefore, the fact that the leak from the roof was first discovered and reported on 22 September 2022 and repaired on 3 October 2022, which was 11 calendar days later, meant that in isolation it dealt with this within the policy’s timescales.
  4. The resident nevertheless raised concerns that the landlord did not identify that it needed scaffolding to repair the roof when it first came to assess this on 23 September 2022, causing an additional delay to the roof repair until it did so on 26 September 2022. Its final stage complaint response accepted and apologised for this and explained that, had it given more information when booking the repairs to the roof on 22 September 2022, it could have identified the leak from the roof and the need for scaffolding sooner. Moreover, while it may have been appropriate for the landlord to have repaired the roof alone as routine repair within 11 calendar days, this did not mean that this was a reasonable timeframe for it to have completed the emergency repair to the lift in.
  5. Under the landlord’s responsive repairs policy, the fact that the resident’s communal lift was the only lift serving all floors of his building, and was affected by a leak that caused a risk of electric shock, meant that this remained an emergency repair that it had to return to complete within a reasonable timeframe. This was still the case even after it had initially made the lift safe on 22 September 2022, and particularly because he explained that he and the other residents of his block were elderly and many of them were vulnerable.
  6. As this reportedly resulted in several residents being stuck in their flats and in others struggling to leave and access their properties via the stairs, including the ambulance service to attend a heart attack victim, while they waited for the landlord to repair their only lift after 11 calendar days on 3 October 2022, it did not do so within a reasonable timeframe. This was contrary to the responsive repairs policy, under which it should have continued to treat this and the related roof leak repair as emergencies due to be completed within 24 hours under its policy, or within a timescale that was as close to this as was possible in the circumstances. It is also of concern that the landlord’s complaint responses did not fully recognise this or offer the resident any compensation to address these failures.
  7. The resident additionally raised concerns that the landlord did not have a contingency plan for when the lift was out of order and he wished to see this. Its complaint responses therefore reassured him that, as part of its contingency plan, it had placed notices on all floors advising that the lift was out of order, and that it had sent all residents a letter on how to contact it for assistance. It was reasonable in the circumstances for the landlord to have communicated with residents about this and provided them with a clear point of contact.
  8. The resident’s concerns for the safety of vulnerable tenants on the first and second floors of his building were also addressed by the landlord’s complaint responses, which confirmed that personal emergency evacuation plans and person-centred fire risk assessments were done for all of its vulnerable residents. However, it was unable to share any of this individual information about other residents with him due to data protection laws. This was a fair and correct stance, as the landlord was obliged by such legislation to protect the confidentiality of their personal data by not sharing this with third parties such as the resident without their consent. Although it reassured him appropriately that it had suitable individualised plans in place to ensure its vulnerable residents’ safety.
  9. It was also reasonable that the landlord demonstrated that it had learnt from the outcome of the resident’s complaint in its final stage complaint response, by accepting that had its staff listed more details on the roof repair that was raised, then it may have been able to identify the cause of the leak and restore the lift sooner. It therefore apologised, acknowledged this and identified staff training needs for its record keeping regarding its repairs in its response.
  10. This was a fair and proportionate response that was in line with this Service’s dispute resolution principles to be fair, put things right and learn from outcomes. The landlord appropriately identified where it may have been able to improve its service to the resident, and it showed learning from the outcome of his complaint to try and prevent such issues from recurring in the future, by providing specific feedback to ensure that as much information was possible was included when registering repairs.
  11. With regard to the landlord’s repair delay, its compensation policy recommends up to £250 compensation for issues where the time taken to resolve them resulted in inconvenience having some impact on the resident. This Service’s remedies guidance also recommends compensation of over £100 for such failures that adversely affected the resident, where the landlord has acknowledged failings and made some attempt to put things right, but has failed to address the detriment to the resident. In this case, it left him as an elderly person without the only lift serving all floors of his building for 11 calendar days because it did not treat restoring this, including by repairing the roof leak, as an emergency or provide the detail necessary to do so sooner in its initial repair report.
  12. As this was contrary to the landlord’s responsive repairs policy, and it did not address the resident’s resulting inconvenience and detriment as recommended by its compensation policy or this Service’s remedies guidance, it has been ordered below to pay him £250 compensation in order to do so. It has also been recommended below to review its staff’s training needs with regard to their application of its compensation policy and our remedies guidance to ensure that it addresses the detriment to its residents in every case in which it acknowledges failings. The landlord has additionally been recommended below to provide the resident with general details of its obligations and approach to providing personalised emergency evacuation plans and fire risk assessments for vulnerable residents, in order to reassure his concerns about this.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in the time taken by it to restore the resident’s communal lift to full working order following a leak.

Order and recommendations

  1. The landlord is ordered to pay the resident £250 compensation within four weeks to address the inconvenience and detriment caused to him by its delay in restoring his communal lift.
  2. It is recommended that the landlord:
    1. Review its staff’s training needs with regard to their application of its compensation policy and this Service’s remedies guidance at https://www.housing-ombudsman.org.uk/about-us/corporate-information/policies/dispute-resolution/policy-on-remedies/, to ensure that it addresses the detriment to its residents in every case in which it acknowledges failings.
    2. Provide the resident with general details of its obligations and approach to providing personalised emergency evacuation plans and fire risk assessments for vulnerable residents, in order to reassure his concerns about this.
  3. The landlord shall contact this Service within four weeks to confirm that it has complied with the above order, and whether it will follow the above recommendations.