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Wandle Housing Association Limited (202301722)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202301722

Wandle Housing Association Limited

12 December 2024

 

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:
    1. Reports of an outstanding repair to the communal TV aerial.
    2. Complaint.

Background and summary of events

  1. The resident lives in a 1 bedroom, second floor flat, which he purchased in January 2021 through the shared ownership scheme. He owns a 30% share of the property and pays the landlord rent for the remaining 70%.
  2. The lease states that the landlord is responsible for repairing all parts of the building that are not the responsibility of the leaseholder. This includes the communal TV aerial. The resident pays a service charge towards the maintenance costs of communal services.
  3. It is not clear from the records who reported the issue, but the landlord’s repair log shows it raised a job on 15 July 2022 to attend to the communal TV aerial. This was because “multiple tenants” were unable to get a signal. On 17 August 2022, the resident wrote to the landlord to raise several new and ongoing repair issues. As part of his email he stated that, since May 2022, he was not able to access his TV subscription service. He added that he could not “even count the amount of times” he had to call, but there was still no progress on the repair.
  4. On 11 October 2022, the landlord sent an email to the resident in error. It was intended for internal use. Within the email, the landlord discussed that it had received a call from the resident regarding its contractor who needed to attend to a communal repair issue. It stated it would require a key for the communal cupboard. The resident did not reply to the landlord’s email. However, correspondence followed between the resident and landlord from 24 November to 16 December 2022 regarding arrangements for the contractor to access the communal cupboard. The records show that the landlord completed the repair on 23 December 2022 and that, following this, the resident’s TV reception returned to normal.
  5. On 17 January 2023, the resident contacted the landlord to raise a stage 1 complaint. He said that:
    1. Following a power cut in his building on 10 May 2022 he had been unable to access his subscription TV channels.
    2. He contacted the TV service provider. However, the engineer who attended told him there was a problem with the communal aerial.
    3. He had phoned the landlord numerous times and was told it would contact him when it established who was responsible for the repair. It was not until November 2022 that the contractor “came down to have a look”.
    4. It took a further 2 months of him chasing the landlord to find out who had the key to get into the communal cupboard.
    5. He was eventually able to track down his neighbourhood officer, who unlocked the cupboard so the contractor could get his TV channels to work.
    6. He felt he was entitled to some compensation as he had been paying for subscription channels he was unable to watch due to the landlord’s delays.
  6. The landlord acknowledged the complaint on 3 February 2023. It then wrote to the resident on 9 February 2023 to say that its contractor was on site from 8am to 10.10am that morning and reported that his TV channels were working normally. It issued its stage 1 response on 10 February 2023. It stated that:
    1. Its contractor visited the block on 9 February 2023. It would take “the appropriate next steps” once it had received the engineer’s report.
    2. It had not received reports from any other residents regarding issues with the communal aerial.
    3. It was responsible for the communal dishes but not for any issues relating to loss of subscription TV channels.
  7. The resident replied on 20 February 2023 and asked the landlord to escalate his complaint. He said that:
    1. Nobody attended his property on the 9 February 2023 because, as he had already explained, the landlord had resolved the issue “just before Christmas”.
    2. His outstanding concerns was that it took “so long to finally get someone” to fix the problem, “which took a matter of minutes”.
    3. He felt the landlord was not dealing with the matter seriously.
  8. The landlord sent the resident its stage 2 response on 27 March 2023. It reiterated that no other resident had raised any issues about the communal aerial and it was not responsible for the loss subscription TV channels. It added that:
    1. Its contractor attended to the communal aerial on 2 occasions. The first time was on 28 September 2022. It reported that the signal on the sports channels was poor and it needed access to the communal cupboard. The second time was on 23 December 2023, where it completed the repair.
    2. It had completed the work within the agreed 21 day timescale from when it had raised the job.
    3. It acknowledged “a potential loss” of service and offered the resident £70, which it said was a “goodwill gesture”.
  9. The resident approached the Ombudsman on 9 May 2024 because he was unhappy with the amount of compensation the landlord had offered. He said he wanted it to reimburse him for the loss of his TV signal. This resulted in him not being able to access his subscription TV channels from May to December 2022.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s policies and procedures

  1. The landlord’s repair policy states that it refers to any repair that is not an emergency and is appointed at the earliest, mutually convenient time as an “appointed repair”. Its service standard is to complete these within 28 days. Where is it agreed that a repair should be treated as “urgent”, it will complete the work within 7 days.
  2. The landlord operates a 2 stage complaints process. It’s complaints policy stated that it will responds to a stage 1 complaints within 10 working days of it being acknowledged. It will provide a stage 2 response within 20 working days. Where it has to extend a response beyond a further 10 working days for stage 1 and 20 for stage 2, it will agree this with the resident. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code.

Reports of an outstanding repair to the communal TV aerial

  1. The landlord has a legal obligation to complete repairs it is responsible for within a ‘reasonable’ timescale. Various factors can affect what constitutes a reasonable timescale, such as volume and complexity of required work or the need for additional materials to be ordered and delivered. The landlord should be able to demonstrate that any delays were unavoidable, and that it did everything it reasonably could to resolve issues appropriately.
  2. The first entry in the landlord’s repair logs relating to the communal TV aerial is dated 15 July 2022. The records detail that the problem was affecting “multiple” tenants. The resident states he phoned the landlord on numerous occasions about this issue, and that he first encountered problems in May 2022 following a power cut. We do not doubt what the resident has said. However, as we have not been provided with any telephone records, or other evidence, we cannot reasonably establish when those calls were likely to have been made. There is also no other evidence suggesting that the landlord was made aware of issues with the aerial prior to 15 July 2022.
  3. It is apparent however that the resident chased up the issue with the communal aerial on 17 August 2022. There is no evidence to show the landlord had taken any action in response to the July 2022 report. It is unclear why it had not followed up the repair with its contractor. It did not give a reason for the delay or offer any explanation. Its target for completing appointed repairs is 28 days. That 34 days had elapsed and the repair had not yet been attended to, or an appointment had not been scheduled, was a departure from the landlord’s repairs policy. There are no records to show the landlord provided the resident, or any other tenants, with updates during this time, or that it was properly tracking the progress of the repair. This was a failing.
  4. It is noted that the landlord sent an email to the resident in error. This was about the outstanding repair and should have been sent internally. It is unclear from the evidence whether the landlord identified the error. It would have been reasonable for it to have ensured that it was proactively monitoring the repair. Had it been doing so, the error could reasonably have been identified sooner and action taken accordingly to notify the contractor and expedite the repair.
  5. However, it was not until a further 43 days, following the resident’s email, that the contractor first attended the block to inspect the aerial. It is noted that, on its initial visit, the contractor was unable to access the communal cupboard in order to complete the repair. This resulted in a further 2 month delay, while the resident made attempts to source the key for the contractor.
  6. Given it was the landlord’s responsibility to repair the aerial, it was unreasonable for it to put the onus on the resident to find the key. This resulted in him taking avoidable time and trouble trying to arrange access to a communal space. Considering its repair obligations, the landlord should have reasonably organised access internally, with the appropriate members of staff.
  7. Furthermore, it is noted that the resident was not familiar with the details of his neighbourhood officer. It is unclear why this was the case. However, the landlord should always ensure it provides residents at the outset with the details of staff they can contact in situation like this. The landlord should review those details on a regular basis to ensure it notifies resident of any staff changes and amends its contact list accordingly. That the resident was left to facilitate access to the cupboard himself contributed to further avoidable delays in completing the repair.
  8. The evidence shows us that the contractor repaired the communal aerial on 23 December 2022. This was nearly 6 months after the evidence shows that the landlord was made aware of the issue, and significantly outside of its appointed repair target. It is accepted that landlords can sometimes have problems with their contractors. Delays can occur due to limited resources or the complexity of the work involved for example. However, from the evidence it is unclear why the landlord could not have completed the repair within its 28 day target. During this time, there is little evidence the landlord made efforts to contact the resident about the repair, or to chase its contractor. It has provided no evidence of effective contract monitoring, repair tracking or attempts to be customer focussed. The landlord has not been able to demonstrate that it took all reasonable steps to respond to the resident’s reports. This was a failing.
  9. It is noted that the landlord offered the resident £70 as a “goodwill gesture” in its stage 2 response. However, it made no attempt to acknowledge its failings or apologise for them. Therefore the basis for the offer is somewhat unclear. It is noted that the landlord made the decision not to reimburse the resident for loss of his subscription service. The Ombudsman states that, as part of its dispute resolution principles, residents should be put back in the position they would have been in if there was no maladministration. It would have been reasonable in the circumstances for the landlord to have explored reimbursing the resident as a way of putting things right. This is because had the issues with the communal aerial been resolved in a timely and appropriate manner, the resident would not have experienced the loss of access to his subscription service for the duration that he did. We have therefore ordered this as the remedy in this case and made a finding of maladministration.

Complaint

  1. The evidence shows that the landlord responded to the resident’s stage 1 complaint within 19 working days, and within 26 working days at stage 2. On both occasions it responded within the maximum time its policy allows before the need to agree a new timescale with the resident. However, the policy stipulates initial response times of 10 and 20 days respectively. This means the resident would have expected either a response within the abovementioned timescales or an update. The landlord should have advised the resident it needed more time, and explained the reason for the delay.
  2. The Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code (the Code) says that responses to stage 2 complaints should not exceed a further 30 days without good reason.  If an extension beyond 10 working days is required to enable the landlord to respond to the complaint fully, this should be agreed by both parties. It is important that landlords carry out thorough investigations and we acknowledge these can sometimes take longer than expected to complete. However, landlords should always ensure they adequately communicate any potential delays to their residents. This will help maintain transparency, along with a positive working relationship between the landlord and resident throughout the complaint. It would also help reassure residents they have not been forgotten about.
  3. The Code requires landlords to undertake thorough complaint investigations and to address all aspects of a complaint. The landlord’s stage 1 response failed to address the concerns the resident raised. It made no reference to his initial report of an outstanding communal aerial issue or the repair that was carried out in December 2022. Furthermore, it failed to acknowledge its delay in responding to the repair.
  4. The landlord’s response only refers to a visit by its contractor in February 2023 that the resident was not aware of. There is no indication it made reasonable efforts to carry out a proper investigation. Its response demonstrates that it failed to establish the facts or whether the issue had been resolved.
  5. It is also noted that the landlord stated in both responses that it had not received any reports from other residents relating to issues with the aerial. This is incorrect and it is unclear how the landlord reached this conclusion. Its repair log states that it had received a report in July 2022 that “multiple” residents were affected by the issue. The evidence therefore suggests that the landlord failed to adequately check its records prior to responding to the complaint. This resulted in the resident receiving a poorly investigated response and spending unnecessary time and trouble escalating his complaint.
  6. The stage 2 response failed to acknowledge the significant delay in completing the repair, or to offer an apology. The landlord’s assertion that it completed the work within its standard timescales failed to recognise the dates the resident reported the issue. It did not acknowledge that it should have raised the repair when residents had first reported it. By suggesting that it had responded to the repair within a reasonable time the landlord’s response came across as defensive. This was inappropriate. The landlord should ensure it is always open and transparent when dealing with complaints. This will help it build trust and promote a positive working relationship between it and its residents.
  7. The stage 2 response also contained typographical errors. It incorrectly states that visits had taken place in 2023 rather than 2022. It is acknowledge that such errors can occur. However, the landlord should always ensure its responses are properly checked before issuing them to avoid providing inaccurate or confusing information.
  8. Furthermore, the landlord offered compensation, of which £20 was in recognition of missed visits. While it was reasonable to acknowledge the inconvenience caused by a missed visit, the landlord had also refuted that were any missed visits. This would likely have caused some confusion. The landlord should always ensure that any compensation it offers directly reflects the failings it has identified. This will demonstrate it is making reasonable efforts to put thing right. The landlord provided inadequate complaint responses to the resident containing factually incorrect information. Taking this into consideration, along with the fact it departed from its complaints policy and the Code, the Ombudsman has made a finding of maladministration.

Determinations (decisions)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s response to reports of an outstanding repair to the communal TV aerial.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s complaint handling.

Orders

  1. The landlord is ordered within 4 weeks of receiving this report to reimburse the resident for the loss of his subscription TV service for 6 months. This covers the period from July 2022, where evidence shows the landlord was made aware of the issue, to December 2022 when it completed the repair. This is subject to the resident providing the relevant billing information.
  2. In addition, within 4 weeks of receiving this report, the landlord to:
    1. Pay the resident £200 in recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused by its poor complaint handling.
    2. Provide an apology to the resident from a senior member of staff for the identified failings. This should be in line with the Ombudsman’s guidance for making apologies.
  3. The landlord to review its complaint training with emphasis on conducting thorough investigations and providing factually accurate responses. Complaint handling staff should be made aware of the importance of properly addressing all aspects of a complaint, and openly acknowledging shortcomings and failings in service where these have been identified. The landlord is to provide evidence it has carried out the review within 8 weeks of receiving this report.

 Recommendations

  1. The landlord should ensure its residents are provided with an updated list of relevant staff contacts. This would be particularly helpful in cases where they require assistance with any communal matters that fall under the landlord’s responsibility.