Yorkshire Housing Limited (202404784)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202404784

Yorkshire Housing Limited

23 September 2025

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 how the landlord handled the resident’s reports of damp and mould.

Background

The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord, a housing association. He lives in the property with his wife and 2 sons.
On 17 April 2023 the resident advised the landlord that the damp-proofing paint it recently applied to his living room walls had not resolved the damp. Over the following 2 months the landlord inspected the living room on 2 occasions and completed a mould treatment. On 20 June 2023 the landlord diagnosed possible rising damp.
On 23 January 2024 the resident made a stage 1 complaint. He complained that the landlord had failed to update him or progress any related works following the June 2023 inspection. He also complained about a number of unrelated outstanding works.
On 26 January 2024 the landlord removed a loose vent and filled in the space left with bricks and cement. On 1 February 2024 the landlord issued a stage 1 response. It acknowledged it had failed to progress works or update him following the June 2023 inspection. It committed to repairing the failed damp works and completing any other outstanding repairs. It also recognised it should have fixed and filled the loose air vent sooner. As redress, it offered the resident £410 in “Love2Shop vouchers”, broken down as:
1. £280 for delays in addressing failed damp work.
2. £70 for delays in repairing the vent.
3. £60 reimbursement for sofa covers.
The landlord’s contractor completed a damp and mould survey on 7 February 2024. It diagnosed condensation as the primary cause of damp and mould, and found it unlikely that rising damp was present. To address this it recommended the landlord complete a series of works including applying anti-damp paint and renewing skirting boards.
The landlord then completed its own inspection on 14 February 2024. Its surveyor corroborated the diagnosis and recommendations made by its contractor and raised some other unrelated repairs which the resident had raised in his stage 1 complaint.
On 12 March 2024 the resident complained that the damp was persisting and that the landlord had failed to address other outstanding works. On 20 March 2024 he escalated his complaint to stage 2 on this basis. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 24 April 2024. It recognised it had failed to suitably address some of the outstanding works. It committed to rectifying the damp repairs, and completing a series of further works to address the issue. It also offered to replace the resident’s living room carpet and provide £500 towards a new sofa which he says was damaged by damp and mould. It also offered a further £500 as redress for stress and inconvenience.
The resident was not satisfied with this and brought his complaint to the Ombudsman on 20 September 2024. He explained that he considered the landlord should offer a greater sum of compensation to reflect the time, stress, and inconvenience he had incurred in chasing the damp and mould works. He also explained that, while the landlord had completed a number of works which were presently successful in resolving any damp and mould, he doubted their effectiveness would continue through winter.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

The resident has complained about the landlord’s handling of his reports of damp and mould since 2020. Typically, we do not investigate matters which were not brought to the landlord’s attention as a formal complaint within 12 months. The resident complained on 23 January 2024. Therefore, this investigation will only consider the landlord’s actions from 23 January 2023 onwards, as matters which preceded this did not occur within 12 months of the complaint.
The resident’s 23 January 2024 stage 1 complaint included concerns about outstanding repairs unrelated to damp and mould. The landlord addressed these at both complaint stages. However, in the complaint the resident brought to us, and in subsequent discussions with us about his complaint, the resident’s outstanding concerns are limited to the landlord’s handling of his reports of damp and mould. Therefore, this investigation will only consider the landlord’s actions in relation to this.

How the landlord handled the resident’s reports of damp and mould

The landlord’s repairs policy defines 3 different types of repairs and how it will respond to each as follows:
1. “Emergency Repairs: repairs that if not reacted to quickly, will create a significant risk to life or well being, or cause considerable damage to the property. We aim to provide attendance within 4 hours of the repair being reported and make safe the immediate danger. We will then attempt to complete the works within 24 hours of the initial report.”
2. “Urgent Repairs: Repairs to be completed within 7 calendar days of reporting. AM/PM appointment offered to customer at time of reporting. External works will not always be appointed at the time of reporting unless access needs to be arranged.
3. “Routine Repairs: Repairs to be completed within 28 calendar days of reporting. AM/PM appointment offered to the customer at the time of reporting. External works will not always be appointed at the time of reporting, unless access needs to be arranged.”
The landlord also had a duty under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS) to ensure that it provided the resident with a home free from hazards. The HHSRS regards damp and mould as potential category 1 hazards which are especially harmful to children aged 14 years or less.
We can see the resident first reported damp and mould in the living room on 17 April 2023. The landlord raised works on the same day, and the repair records note that “damp returning in…living room.” The landlord categorised this as a routine repair. The landlord then completed a pre-inspection of the living room 30 days later on 17 May 2023 and confirmed the presence of damp. This was 2 days beyond its repairs timescales. It then completed a more thorough inspection on 20 June 2023, which included taking chemical samples of the walls, and diagnosed:
1. Possible rising damp.
1. Damp proof course (DPC) failure above the skirting boards.
We can see the landlord then raised a mould treatment for the bathroom on 12 June 2023, and that it completed this well within its routine repair timescales on 19 June 2023.
However, the landlord then failed to attempt any kind of works to address the issues in the living room or provide any updates to the resident for the remainder of 2023. We can see it chased the contractor on multiple occasions in October and November 2023 to inspect and draft an action plan. These emails do not appear to have prompted the contractor to take any action.
While we note the landlord attempted to progress things from October 2023 onwards, it made no attempts to do so from June 2023 until this point. We consider this likely delayed a resolution, which likely caused the resident distress.
By 23 January 2024 there had been no progress and so the resident raised a stage 1 complaint about the delay. Specifically, he complained that the landlord had failed to:
1. Update him on the outcome of the June 2023 inspection.
2. Address a loose vent inside the property.
3. Repair faulty rainwater gullies.
The landlord attended and replaced the loose vents with bricks and cement on 26 January 2024. The stage 1 complaint is the first evidence we have seen of the landlord being made aware of this issue, and so it acted promptly and within its repair timescales by fixing this 2 days later.
The landlord then issued its stage 1 response on 1 February 2024. It did well by fully acknowledging its delay from June 2023 up to this point in progressing the damp works. It also committed to inspect the other failed damp works and address them. However, it did not provide any timescales for these works or offer any specific appointments as per its repairs policy. We consider this was likely frustrating for the resident.
We can see the landlord continued to chase the contractor throughout January 2024 to inspect the property and draft an action plan for resolving the damp issue. This was appropriate, and we can also see the landlord intensified these efforts following the stage 1 complaint. These attempts were evidently successful since the contractor then completed a damp and mould survey on 7 February 2024.
The surveyor diagnosed that the damp was likely being caused by condensation, which contradicted the June 2023 diagnosis of rising damp. It recommended the following works to resolve it:
1. Remove skirtings and dispose of.
2. Scrape loose paint from the walls and roughen up exposed plaster with sandpaper.
3. Apply two coats of Thermokote [anti-damp paint].
4. Renew skirtings and fix on a PE Foam Flooring underlay and allow to cover floor approximately 100mm.
The landlord then completed its own inspection on 14 February 2024 which corroborated this diagnosis and action plan. Emails from the resident to the landlord indicate that it had completed these works by 12 March 2024. However, there are no repair records to indicate precisely when it did so, or to what standard. We expect landlords to keep clear audit trails of any repairs they complete, and to keep residents updated about progress of works. Given the absence of any record of this, we are not persuaded that the landlord completed the repairs within its routine timescales, or that it kept the resident suitably informed.
The resident escalated his complaint via emails on 12 and 20 March 2024. He complained that:
1. The damp was persisting despite the completion of the skirting renewal and anti-damp paint works.
2. The anti-damp paint did not texturally match the existing paint on the other living room walls, which meant he had to sand it down himself.
3. The landlord had failed to remove or refit the radiators before and after these works, which meant he had to do this himself.
4. The landlord had not explained what it intended to do about damp and mould in his 2 sons’ bedrooms.
In its stage 2 response on 24 April 2024 the landlord addressed this. It recognised it had failed to:
1. Apply the damp paint to texturally match existing walls.
2. Remove and refit the radiators prior to and after the paint works.
3. Honor commitments it made at stage 1.
To put this right it committed to:
1. Inspect the bathroom fan and external air vents.
2. Repaint the living room and install a new radiator.
3. Complete a mould treatment of the bedrooms on 2 May 2024 and behind kitchen cupboards on a future date.
It offered to replace the resident’s living room carpet and provide £500 towards a new sofa, which it noted he had claimed were damaged by damp and mould. It also offered £500 compensation for stress and inconvenience.
The landlord did well here to recognise that the damp and mould appeared to be persisting and to outline an action plan of what it intended to do about it. It did well to recognise that it should have removed and refitted the radiators before and after the painting works. It appropriately recognised its mistake in applying the damp paint with a long-piled roller and explained this was what created the textured appearance. It also responded empathetically by recognising that the resident incurred stress and inconvenience in addressing both this and the radiator installation himself.
We note that, until the stage 2 escalation, the resident had not raised concerns about damp and mould in his sons’ bedrooms. Therefore, it would not be reasonable to expect the landlord to have raised works to address this before 12 March 2024. We consider it acted appropriately by raising these works in response to the resident’s reports and updating the resident on this in its final response.
We also note the landlord acted positively by offering to replace and reimburse the resident for furniture he said had been damaged by damp and mould. In doing so it demonstrated a willingness to put the resident back in the position he likely would have been in were it not for its own delays.
However, following the stage 2 response there are no repair records to indicate when the landlord completed the works it committed to. In a phone call with the Ombudsman on 20 September 2024 the resident explained that the landlord had completed the following works:
1. Mould treatments.
2. Anti-mould paint applied on walls.
3. Repaired rain water gullies which were causing water to pool under floorboards.
4. Replaced all concrete floor joints with wooden joints.
5. Replaced all the floorboards.
6. Installed an extractor fan in the bathroom.
The resident also indicated that, while these works had been successful at this point, he did not consider they would continue to prevent damp and mould throughout the coming winter months.
It is positive that the landlord appears to have completed the works it committed to at stage 2. However, the lack of corresponding repair or communication records is concerning, and does not persuade us that it did so within its routine repair timescales or that it kept him suitably updated. We would expect the landlord to have kept clear audit trails of these repairs, and of any follow up inspections to check on the relative success of each repair.
In the absence of this kind of evidence, we do not consider the landlord reasonably satisfied itself that it has fulfilled its duties under HHSRS guidance to ensure the property was free of hazardous mould. For this reason, we will order it to inspect the entire property for damp and mould. If it identifies any issues, we will order it to raise works to address these and provide timescales to the resident.
In summary then, the landlord delayed unreasonably in progressing damp and mould related works from June 2023 until late January 2024. It also failed to adequately communicate with the resident during this period. Its approach then improved following the 7 February 2024 inspection, as we can see it attempted a series of works over the following 7 months to resolve the issue.
We also note that, as of 20 September 2024, the issue appeared to have been resolved. However, during this 7 month period the landlord routinely failed to keep adequate repair records or keep the resident suitably updated.
The landlord has thus far offered the resident the following sums of compensation:
1. £350 for its delays in progressing works from June 2023 to 1 February 2024.
2. £500 for stress and inconvenience caused by its omissions in its handling of the damp and mould issues up until 24 April 2024.
The landlord’s guidance on compensation does not clearly set out how it calculates discretionary compensation payments. Therefore, we have used our own guidance to determine the appropriate sum. Our guidance sets out that payments between £600 and £1000 are appropriate to put right failures which have significantly impacted residents.
The landlord has therefore already offered the resident a sum at the mid-upper range of our scale for the impact caused by its omissions from June 2023 to 24 April 2024. In determining whether this is appropriate we have considered how these failures likely caused the resident distress and inconvenience. However, we have balanced this with the evidence which indicates the landlord has completed the works it committed to at both complaint stages. With this in mind, we consider the compensation offered as redress for its omissions up until 24 April 2024 is sufficient to put things right.
However, we have also considered that the landlord failed to keep adequate records or meaningfully communicate with the resident about the works following 24 April 2024, and that the compensation thus far offered does not address this period. With this in mind, we will order the landlord to pay the resident a further £100 compensation, which will take the total sum to the upper-end of our scale. We consider this is appropriate given the repeated nature of the omissions already recognised and addressed at both complaint stages.

Determination

In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in how the landlord handled the resident’s reports of damp and mould.

Orders

The landlord is to pay the resident £100 compensation for its omissions in handling damp and mould works from 24 April 2024 onwards.
The landlord is to evidence payment of the £850 it offered at stages 1 and 2 for delays in progressing damp and mould works. If it has not already paid this, it is to do so.
The landlord is to complete a damp and mould inspection of the property. If it identifies any issues, it is to complete an action plan of works to address these with timescales and provide this to the resident.
The landlord is to provide evidence of compliance with these orders within 4 weeks of the date of this report.