The Riverside Group Limited (202317003)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202317003

The Riverside Group Limited

10 April 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

1. The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a gutter leak.

Background

2. The resident has been a leaseholder of the landlord, a housing association, since 2007. The property is a 2-bedroom ground floor flat.
3. On 22 March 2023 the resident reported overflowing gutters at the rear of the property. He logged a complaint on 3 April 2023 saying:
   1. He was told the landlord would contact him before 5pm on 31 March 2023 and the job would be completed by 3 April 2023, but this had not happened.
   2. He disputed that the landlord’s contractors had visited on 3 April 2023, as the gutters could not be seen from the front and access was needed via his property. No one had contacted him on the day.
   3. If the contractors had attended the property, they would have seen the equipment they ordered (a SkyVac) to clean the gutters could not go through the rear.
4. In the landlord’s stage 1 response of 13 April 2023, it said its contractors had visited and carried out a visual inspection on 3 April 2023. Due to the height of the building they decided a SkyVac was needed and had booked this in for 21 April 2023. It said that, while the resident disputed the contractor carried out an inspection, given the height of the building and the nature of the report, they made a reasonable judgement to order the SkyVac.
5. On 19 April 2023 the resident made a further complaint about internal damage caused by the leak. The landlord added this to the existing complaint and sent him a claim form to complete. The gutters were cleaned on 21 April 2023 and the repair was marked as complete.
6. The resident escalated his complaint on 25 July 2023. He said the leak had recurred and was reported to the landlord on 24 April 2023, and he was unhappy with the time being taken to resolve it. He said the ongoing leak had caused damage to the internal décor.
7. In its first stage 2 response of 23 August 2023 the landlord apologised for the lack of communication and length of time taken to agree a resolution. It said scaffolding would be erected on 25 August 2023, with the repair scheduled for 31 August 2023. On 20 October 2023, the landlord issued its second stage 2 response saying:
   1. It was sorry for the time taken to complete the repair and the poor communication; it would learn from its mistakes.
   2. The reported repairs had been completed on 6 October 2023.
   3. It would cover the £100 insurance excess and pay £75 for delays. However, it would not pay for a missed appointment the resident claimed because it attended on the day, but identified the repair could not be completed.
8. The resident referred his complaint to us on 30 October 2023 and said he was unhappy:
   1. That the landlord did not diagnose the problem early and instead made a ‘reasonable assessment’.
   2. With the decisions taken over a 6-month period when the gutters were first cleaned and then replaced, making the cleaning redundant and wasting weeks.
   3. He was told numerous different reasons the water was entering the property, including the newly fitted gutters having to be re-aligned as they were not fitted properly.
   4. The scaffolders stated they had no access to the property when they did and that caused a 4 to 6 weeks’ delay.
   5. The scaffolders did not put up enough scaffolding for the job, causing an additional delay.
   6. The contractors damaged the back gate (the landlord offered to repair this, but the resident had this repaired himself).
   7. The landlord did not offer a fair level of compensation, particularly considering the internal damage caused, which now needed to be dried out and repaired.
9. On 3 December 2023 the leak reoccurred, and the repair was finally resolved on 15 January 2024, 9 months after it was initially reported. The resident has told us that, while the repair has been resolved to his satisfaction, he does not believe the landlord has compensated him adequately for the delays, the length of time taken, and the trouble and inconvenience caused.

Assessment and findings

Gutter leak repair

10. It is not within our remit to assess or award for a loss of earnings, so this is not addressed further in this report. However, consideration has been given to general distress and inconvenience which the resident may have experienced as a result of any service failure by the landlord. The resident may wish to consider seeking independent advice on making a personal liability claim in respect of any additional losses.
11. The landlord has accepted its own and its contractors’ poor service levels in its complaint responses. Therefore, the question before us is whether those failings amount to maladministration and, if so, whether appropriate redress was offered to put things right.
12. As the freeholder, the landlord has limited repair obligations for a property where the lease was sold. It is responsible for repairs and maintenance of communal areas, including the gutters. Its repair policy categorises repairs and gives associated response times as emergency (12 hours), urgent (5 days), and routine (28 days). The policy says the landlord will communicate with the resident clearly and effectively in the delivery of repairs.
13. The repair reported by the resident met the definition of routine. Although he said his report was logged as an emergency repair, there is no evidence to support this, nor would we expect this for the repair that was reported.
14. There is dispute over the quality of inspections carried out by the landlord which the resident believes led to avoidable delays. The landlord is accountable for its public expenditure and therefore a proportionate approach in its initial investigations was reasonable. It is not unexpected that the landlord conducted repairs it believed was the cause of the leak/overflow, and when the issue reoccurred, that it then investigated further.
15. However, after the initial repair failed soon after completion, requiring the resident to continually chase for a resolution, the landlord should have done more to get this resolved sooner. It has not explained why a routine repair, which should have taken 28 days, took 9 months to resolve. Neither has it explained why the repairs, if they were conducted correctly, kept failing. It should have provided clearer and more detailed explanations and updates to the resident, particularly where he had told it of the water damage being caused internally.
16. The evidence shows there were avoidable delays in installing adequate scaffolding to complete the job. An explanation was not provided to the resident or us for why the alternative access for the scaffolding was missed in the first place, and then not identified earlier than it was. The landlord wasted weeks trying to contact the local council, and then obtaining quotes for access via the alleyway, which was all unnecessary.
17. The landlord has not explained why insufficient scaffolding was then installed, causing the job to be delayed until additional scaffolding could be fitted. Its repairs policy requires it to keep the resident proactively updated but evidence shows it was the resident who was chasing for updates, and still did not receive adequate or timely explanations.
18. In light of the avoidable delays, the poor communication, and the number of failed repairs, we have found maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a gutter leak. It has apologised and offered £175 compensation for its failures, but this award is not in line with our remedies guidance as it does not accurately reflect the trouble and inconvenience caused. The landlord is therefore ordered to pay the resident a further £225 for the time, trouble, stress and inconvenience caused by its failures, in line with our remedies guidance.
19. We encourage landlords to self-assess against our Spotlight reports following publication. In March 2019, we published our Spotlight on complaints about repairs. The evidence gathered during this investigation shows the landlord’s practice was not in line with the recommendations made in that report. We therefore encourage the landlord to consider the findings and recommendations of our Spotlight report.

Determination

20. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a gutter leak.

Orders

21. Within 4 weeks of this report, the landlord is ordered to provide evidence that it has paid directly to the resident (and not offset against any rent arrears) £225 compensation, in addition to the £175 previously offered, in recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused by its poor handling of the reports of repairs for a gutter leak.