Applications are open to join the next Housing Ombudsman Resident Panel – find out more Housing Ombudsman Resident Panel.

GreenSquareAccord Limited (202307331)

Back to Top

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202307331

GreenSquareAccord Limited

18 July 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 entering the resident’s garage and disposing of the contents.
  2. The Ombudsman has also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord. The property is a 4-bedroom house, with a garage situated below the next-door property. The landlord is a housing association.
  2. In April 2023 the landlord cleared the contents of the next-door property which had become vacant earlier in 2023. During this, on 18 and 19 April 2023, the landlord entered and emptied the contents of the resident’s garage. The resident estimated the cost to replace the removed goods as approximately £11,000.
  3. On 24 April 2023 the resident submitted a stage 1 complaint. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 26 July 2023. The resident escalated their complaint to stage 2 on 9 August 2023.
  4. The landlord issued its final response on 25 August 2023. It upheld the resident’s complaint and stated it accepted:
    1. It had not handled the resident’s stage 1 complaint in the true spirit of its complaint procedure.
    2. It had not clearly explained that, having passed the matter to its insurers, it could not provide detailed responses as doing so may have prejudiced or invalidated the insurance claim.
    3. It had not given sufficient attention to recognising the resident’s experience.
    4. It had delayed in dealing with the resident’s complaint and failed to give regular updates about the progress of the investigation.
    5. It had failed to make the reasonable adjustments the resident had asked for.
  5. The landlord offered its apologies for the distress and inconvenience caused by its handling of the resident’s complaint and offered £1,650 in compensation. This comprised of:
    1. £750 for poor complaint handling.
    2. £750 for distress and inconvenience caused by its handling of the complaint.
    3. £150 for the resident’s time and effort spent pursuing the complaint.

Events after the end of the complaints procedure

  1. On 12 February 2024 the resident issued a claim at court for £10,000 against the landlord for the cost of the goods removed from their garage. The resident has advised this service that they accepted a settlement offer of £9,000.

Assessment and findings

Jurisdiction

  1. What the Ombudsman can and cannot consider is called our jurisdiction. This is set out in the Scheme.
  2. Paragraph 41(c) of the Scheme states the Ombudsman cannot consider complaints which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, concern matters that are the subject of court proceedings or were the subject of court proceedings where judgement on the merits were given.
  3. Paragraph 42(e) of the Scheme states the Ombudsman may not consider complaints which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, concern matters where a complainant has or had the opportunity to raise the subject matter of the complaint as part of legal proceedings.
  4. Having considered the resident’s issued claim against the landlord, the Ombudsman is satisfied that the matters raised in the substantive complaint set out at paragraph 1 of this report are the subject of court proceedings.
  5. If there are any elements of the substantive complaint that the resident had not included in their issued claim, the Ombudsman is satisfied that the resident has had the opportunity to raise these as part of the legal proceedings, in accordance with paragraph 42(e) of the Scheme.
  6. For these reasons, this investigation will not consider the landlord entering the resident’s garage and disposing of the contents. It will focus on the landlord’s handling of the complaint that the resident made.

The landlord’s complaint handling

  1. Paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme states the Ombudsman may determine the investigation of a complaint immediately if satisfied that the member has offered redress to the complainant prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint satisfactorily. This will result in a finding of ‘reasonable redress’.
  2. The landlord has accepted it did not issue its stage 1 response within the timescales set out in its own policy or the Code. It also did not issue its final response within the timescale set out in its policy. It was appropriate for the landlord to have acknowledged the delays in its final response and apologise for the distress and inconvenience this may have caused.
  3. At the time of the resident’s complaint, the landlord had a 3 step complaints process. Step 1 was informal resolution of the complaint. Steps 2 and 3 were similar to stages 1 and 2 of the process as set out in the Code.
  4. In the Ombudsman’s view, the landlord’s 3 step process may have caused confusion and was unlikely to have been in line with the requirements of the Code. However, the Ombudsman is aware the landlord has since implemented a new complaints policy which complies with the Code by having a 2-stage complaint procedure.
  5. The landlord’s final response identified that, alongside the delay in providing responses, it had not been as clear as it could have been when explaining its position. It also identified that it had not given due consideration to the impact that the initial incident and the landlord’s subsequent complaint handling had had on the resident. It was reasonable for the landlord to have acknowledged these failures.
  6. It was appropriate for the landlord to accept that it had given incorrect information in its stage 1 response. It was reasonable for it to have provided an explanation for why it had previously stated it had numbered the garages and confirmation that it had now done this. It explained it had obtained date-stamped photographs of the completed work and supplied these to the resident.
  7. The landlord’s offer of compensation for the identified failures in complaint handling is more than the award the Ombudsman would make to recognise the distress and inconvenience caused by the complaint handling. On this basis, and considering the landlord’s acknowledgement and acceptance of its failures, the Ombudsman considers the landlord has offered reasonable redress to the resident.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 41(c) and 42(e) of the Scheme, the Ombudsman has not investigated the complaint about the landlord entering the resident’s garage and disposing of the contents.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme, the landlord offered reasonable redress for its complaint handling.