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Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council (202312994)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202312994

Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council

31 October 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 handling of:
    1. The resident’s personal information.
    2. The utility supplier when the resident’s tenancy started.
    3. The associated complaint.

Jurisdiction

  1. What the Ombudsman can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. This is governed by the Scheme. When a complaint is brought to this service, the Ombudsman must consider all the circumstances of the case, as there are sometimes reasons why a complaint will not be investigated.
  2. Paragraph 42.j. of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme) states the Ombudsman may not consider complaints which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion:
    1. Fall properly within the jurisdiction of another Ombudsman, regulator or complaint-handling body.
  3. Part of the resident’s complaint to the landlord was that it breached its responsibilities as a data controller when using a third-party company. This Service is unable to investigate this part of the complaint, as it falls within the jurisdiction of the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). The resident should refer this part of his complaint to the ICO to investigate.

Background

  1. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord which is a local council. The property is a 3-bedroom house. The tenancy commenced in May 2021.
  2. The resident initially complained to the landlord on 11 May 2022. However, the landlord was unable to contact the resident for several months to discuss his complaint and obtain further information to enable it to provide a stage 1 response. The resident contacted the landlord again on 18 May 2023 to formally complain. During the complaint, the resident informed the landlord that his mental health had been affected.
  3. The landlord provided its stage 1 response on 8 June 2023 which acknowledged its mistake in that it did not originally set up his energy supplier to SSE energy solutions (SSE) ahead of his tenancy start date, in line with its Energize Portal Housing Office Guide. It explained it was due to a staff training oversight and apologised to the resident, offering £250 compensation.
  4. The resident escalated his complaint on 22 June 2023, and the landlord provided its stage 2 response on 4 July 2023. It maintained its stage 1 position and made assurances it would provide training to staff to avoid a repeat occurrence.

Assessment and findings

The utility supplier when the resident’s tenancy started

  1. The landlord’s void policy states it would use a partner company which switched the energy supplier of the property when it becomes void. As a new tenancy begins, the energy supplier account would be assigned to the resident under his name on the move in date. The resident would then be able to switch to their preferred energy supplier after this.
  2. The landlord’s investigation following the complaint, found it did not follow its policy during the void period. The resident changed his energy supplier to Scottish Power after moving into the property however, the energy supplier was changed to SSE after the resident’s tenancy began when the landlord retrospectively updated its system to confirm his tenancy commenced. The resident was unaware of this and believed his supplier was Scottish Power.
  3. When the resident raised concerns, he received a backdated bill of £1,905.87 from Scottish Power. Following a dispute the resident raised with Citizens Advice, SSE did not charge the resident for the period it was his supplier because of the landlord’s error. The bill charged to him was therefore calculated from his estimated energy usage with his originally intended supplier, Scottish Power from the beginning of his tenancy.
  4. The landlord acknowledged its mistake for changing his energy supplier after his tenancy commenced, as part of its void policy. It apologised and provided an explanation that the mistake occurred because a staff member had not received the appropriate training. It gave assurances it would take learning from the incident and offered the resident £250 compensation for the inconvenience.
  5. The resident believed a direct debit had been leaving his account to Scottish Power from June 2021. He explained he realised around March 2022 the payments had not been taken. We appreciate the resident was distressed and inconvenienced by the backdated bill.
  6. In the Ombudsman’s consideration of this complaint, there was evidence of maladministration in the landlord’s communication with the resident and its administrative duties which adversely affected the resident and affected his mental health.
  7. The landlord’s offer of £250 compensation showed it wanted to remedy the complaint by apologising and learning from the incident. Its offer of compensation was in line with the Ombudsman’s financial remedy scale for a failing which adversely impacted the resident. The landlord’s handling of how it set up his utility supplier when his tenancy started was therefore reasonable redress.

The associated complaint

  1. The resident initially brought his complaint to the landlord on 11 May 2022. The landlord stated it was unable to contact the resident to discuss his complaint and obtain further information. While the landlord believed it needed to speak with the resident, it has not provided any evidence to show its attempts to make contact or what parts it was unable to respond to, or the information it required.
  2. While this Service appreciates it may have been beneficial for the landlord to discuss the complaint with the resident, his complaint was set out clearly. This Service would therefore expect the landlord to have acknowledged the complaint and provided a stage 1 response, despite struggling to discuss the complaint in further detail. The landlord failed to follow The Code and its complaints policy timescales. This was evidence of a service failure.
  3. The resident brought his stage 1 complaint to the landlord again on 18 May 2023. The landlord did not provide its stage 1 response until 8 June 2023. This was not in line with the landlord’s complaint handling policy or The Code timescales of 10 working days. Furthermore, there is no evidence the landlord communicated with the resident about delays to provide its stage 1 response, or sought to agree an extension with him. This was unreasonable and left the resident in the complaint handling process without managing his expectations to expect a resolution of the complaint. This caused him distress and inconvenience. In the Ombudsman’s opinion, the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint was maladministration.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 42.j. of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme the landlord’s handling of the resident’s personal information was outside of jurisdiction.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 53.b. of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was reasonable redress by the landlord in its handling of the utility supplier when the resident’s tenancy started.
  3. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was maladministration by the landlord in its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord is ordered to:
    1. Apologise in writing to the resident for the complaint handling failings identified in this investigation.
    2. Pay the resident £250 compensation in recognition of the time and trouble caused by its complaint handling failures.

Recommendations

  1. If it has not done so already, the landlord should also pay the resident the £250 compensation offered in its stage 1 response.