Thirteen Housing Group Limited (202116721)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202116721

Thirteen Housing Group Limited

23 May 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 the resident’s reports of a leak in the bathroom.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord. The resident lives in a bungalow.
3. On the 3rd April 2018, the resident contacted the landlord to report that there was a leak in the bathroom of her property. She advised the landlord that she was unsure where the stop tap was and she had received a high water bill.
4. The landlord arranged for its contractor to attend the property on 18 April 2018 to inspect the toilet. It had found a leak from the toilet and adjusted the toilet so that it flushed less water. The landlord’s records suggest it had also ensured everything in the bathroom was working correctly. No follow-up appointments were required to carry out further repairs and the landlord received no further reports of an increased water bill or any reports of any further leaks from the resident for three years.
5. There was no further correspondence between the landlord and resident until 16 July 2021, when the resident reported that the water supply pipe to the taps underneath the bath was leaking and that the water had soaked underneath the linoleum flooring, soaking the carpet outside the bathroom. The resident had sent pictures showing the soaked and wet carpets and flooring. The landlord had raised the resident’s concerns as an out of hours emergency repair. It responded to the resident’s reports by arranging for its contractor to attend the same day. On inspection, it concluded repairs would need to be carried out to a pipe serving the bath.
6. The landlord’s contractor attended in August 2021 and identified that the fibre washer on the bath needed replacing. The contractor identified that the reason for the leak was due to general wear and tear of the current washer. The contractor also replaced part of the bath pipe and confirmed this had resolved the leak. The contractor stated that it looked as though the leak had been ongoing for a long time which was the reason the resident received a £600 water bill.
7. The resident escalated her complaint in September 2021, on the basis that she believed the landlord was responsible for her increased water bill and damage to her flooring caused by the leak. The landlord issued its final response to the complaint in October 2021. It explained that on the balance of probability, it could only be held liable if it directly caused the damage to the resident’s flooring and if it failed to attend to the reported problem within a reasonable period of time. Therefore, the landlord concluded it could not be liable or responsible for the damage or increase in the resident’s water bills. It recommended that the resident follow up with her contents insurer with regard to damage caused to flooring and suggested the resident contact her water supplier to discuss her options of reimbursement for her high water bills on this occasion.
8. In her complaint to the Ombudsman the resident explained that, to resolve matters, she would like the landlord to offer compensation for the damage caused to her flooring as well as for her high water bill.

Assessment and findings

Policies and Procedures

9. The tenancy agreement says the landlord is obliged to maintain and keep in good repair and proper working order any installations provided for the supply of water including sinks, flushing systems and waste pipes.
10. The landlord’s complaints policy says it aims to attend all emergency repairs within a timescale of 24 hours and to attend all non-emergency repairs by appointment agreed with the resident.
11. An example of an emergency repair is given as a blocked or leaking main drain or pipe and a loss of water supply.
12. An ‘out of hours’ emergency repair is defined as a repair outside of normal working hours

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a leak in the bathroom.

13. The landlord has followed its obligations in respect of the bathroom repairs as per the tenancy agreement. As explained above, the landlord was obliged to keep installations as to the supply of water and flushing systems in good working order.
14. The Ombudsman has not disregarded the resident’s reports of what happened in 2018, however the landlord’s contractor has given a different account of their visit. The resident has said that she did not report that the toilet was leaking and the contractor did not fix the toilet during this visit, the operative simply adjusted the toilet flush. The contractor has told the landlord that the operative identified a leak from the toilet and fixed this, whilst at the same time adjusting the flush. Where there are conflicting accounts of what happened and a lack of evidence to support either version, it is not possible for the Ombudsman, as an independent and impartial observer to say with any certainty which account is correct. The landlord would generally be expected to keep records of repairs but it would not be expected to keep detailed records indefinitely and it is therefore understandable that the landlord may not have detailed information on exactly what work was carried out in 2018, due to the length of time which has passed since this appointment.
15. The landlord’s complaints policy refers to emergency repairs being carried out within 24 hours. The landlord had adhered to its policy in sending its contractors out of hours and on the same day when the resident had reported the leak again in 2021. It had also attempted repairs to replace a pipe where it had thought was the source of the leak. The contractor had thought the leak was ongoing for some time and the pictures provided by the resident do show the damage to the carpet and flooring, which would suggest that the leak may have been happening for some time. The resident has suggested that the issue may have been ongoing since 2013, based on her higher-than-expected water bills for this period. Whilst it is possible that the leak was going on for several years, there is no way to determine how long the leak had been ongoing for, as the photographs do not show this and the contractor did not specify a timeframe for the leak.
16. Overall, the landlord was entitled to believe that it had fixed the issue in 2018 because there were no further reports of leaks for three years. The landlord would not have been expected to carry out invasive investigations such as lifting flooring etc to check there were no other leaks as this would have caused disruption for the resident and the landlord had no reason to think the leak was not resolved as there were no further reports of leaks.  The landlord can only act on the information it is given when arranging repairs. It is understandable that the resident did not report the leak sooner as there were no signs of it, aside from the high water bills. However, as there were no other signs of a leak, there was no reason for the landlord to look at it sooner.

Determination

17. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration by the landlord in respect of the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a leak in the bathroom.