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Southwark Council (202017218)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202017218

Southwark Council

1 July 2021


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 concerns the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of noise emanating from the water tanks in their building.

Background and summary of events

Background

  1. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord, which is a local authority. The property is a flat in a communal building.
  2. The landlord operates a two-stage complaint process. When a complaint is received, it will send an acknowledgement within three working days and provide a stage one response within 15 working days. If the complainant is dissatisfied with the response, they can request an escalation of the complaint. The landlord will then undertake a review and provide a stage two response within 25 working days. This will be the landlord’s final response to the complaint.

Summary of events

  1. On 16 September 2020 the resident wrote to the landlord. She described the issues she had experienced due to noise from the water tanks in the loft above her property, explaining that it affected her while working at home during the day and also during the night by interrupting her sleep. As a resolution to the problem, the resident requested that the landlord considered insulating either the water tanks or the ceiling.
  2. The landlord acknowledged the complaint on 25 September 2020. It informed the resident that a work order had been raised for an engineer to inspect the communal cold water tanks in the loft, and that it would provide a response once this investigation had concluded.
  3. The landlord sent a stage one complaint response to the resident on 2 October 2020. It provided the resident the report of the investigation it undertook relating to the noise from the water tanks. The report described the readings taken from the four water tank rooms which showed ambient noise levels of 37db-50 decibels (db) and noise levels of 50db-58db when the tanks were filling with water.
  4. The engineer recorded the tanks filling with water with the tank lids taken off, in order to depress the valve to allow a full rate of water to fill the tank. They noted that this would have given louder than normal readings as the lids were usually bolted into place.
  5. The engineer then described their visit to the resident, who informed them that she had not heard any noise from the water tank while he was taking readings. The engineer noted that the water tank directly above the property uses a different type of valve than the other tanks, but that the that noise recorded from the tank was comparable to the other water tanks and it was not the loudest tank they had recorded. The report concluding by stating that the tank did bit in itself constitute a noise nuisance.
  6. The landlord informed the resident that it had not upheld her complaint as the investigation had not found any evidence of noise nuisance from the water tanks.
  7. The resident wrote to the landlord on 3 October 2020 and requested an escalation of the complaint on the grounds that the investigation occurred when the water tanks were full, therefore no noise would be heard. She explained that the noise she heard was of the empty tanks filling up with water.
  8. The resident wrote again on 17 October 2020 and asked for an update on her escalation request.  The landlord escalated the complaint on 19 October 2020 and sent a stage two complaint response to the resident on 17 December 2020. It informed her that:
    1. Following her escalation request, a further investigation of the water tanks was undertaken.
    2. The investigation confirmed that the tanks have the capacity to refill at the same rate as water empties. Therefore, the water tanks were never empty.
    3. The water tanks had been found to refill at the same noise level as water tanks in other buildings in the scheme.
    4. The water tank directly above the resident’s property had been found to refill at the same rate as the other tanks and at a similar noise volume. The water tank had also been assessed to be in good working order.
    5. It therefore could not uphold the complaint as it had found no evidence of a mechanical and/or installation fault causing noise that could be considered noise nuisance.

Assessment and findings

  1. Section 79 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 concerns noise nuisance and inspections. Section 79(1)(g) of the act states that “noise emitted from premises so as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance” constitutes statutory noise nuisance.
  2. The landlord took appropriate action in line with its obligations by arranging an inspection of the water tanks to ensure that it was in compliance with Section 79(1)(g). The investigation report explained how the noise recordings were made, under what circumstances the two sets of recordings were taken, how the noise meter operated, and why these findings did not constitute noise nuisance.
  3. When this was disputed by the resident, the landlord arranged a further inspection. It then informed the resident how the water tanks operated and refilled, which prevented them from ever being empty. The landlord also confirmed that the water tank directly above the resident’s property was in good working order, operating at the same volume as the other tanks in the loft, which were operating at the same volume as the water tanks in other buildings. This information was provided to the resident in the stage two complaint response.
  4. It is reasonable for the landlord to rely on the recommendations of appropriately qualified contractors and staff when reaching conclusions. The Ombudsman has not disregarded the resident’s concerns about the noise or the limitations of the inspections. However, the resident has not provided any supporting evidence to either the landlord or this Service which disputed the landlord’s findings and suggested that the water tank above the property was causing noise nuisance.
  5. Therefore, there is no evidence of service failure in the landlord’s response to the complaint. The landlord took the resident’s reports of noise nuisance seriously. It arranged two inspections of the water tanks at each stage of the complaint process and explained in detail why it had not upheld the complaint based on the conclusions of the investigations.

 

 

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was no maladministration by the landlord in respect of its response to the resident’s reports of noise emanating from the water tanks in their building.