Brighton and Hove City Council (202419152)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202419152

Brighton and Hove City Council

9 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 bedbugs in the property.

Background

2. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord, which is a housing association. The property is a 2-bedroom flat. The resident lives with his wife and 5 children.
3. According to the landlord’s records, the resident reported bedbugs to it 3 times in the autumn of 2023. On each occasion, the landlord arranged for pest control to attend the property and spray pesticide treatment.
4. On 6 December 2023 the resident raised a complaint with the landlord. He said there had been a bedbug infestation for 3 months and pest control had sprayed the property on 3 occasions, but it had made no difference. He was worried about his children, including a 3-month-old baby, as they were regularly being bitten all over. He asked the landlord to take further action of either more effective pest control or rehousing.
5. The landlord responded at stage 1 of its complaint process on 13 December 2023. It said its pest control team reported the property was full of belongings, and they could not fully access the mattress. It said it had arranged another appointment for 13 December 2023 and asked the resident to clear as many items as possible from under and around the beds.
6. The resident said he was dissatisfied with the landlord’s decision on 22 January 2024. He said pest control had attended again, and it had still made no difference. He said the repairs team were aggressive with him on the phone. He also said he was concerned about the chemicals being used harming his children. He asked the landlord to rehouse his family temporarily while clearing the bedbugs.
7. The landlord provided its final complaint response on 30 January 2024. It apologised for the situation and said the contractors reported seeing no live bugs on their last visit and asked the resident to provide photographic evidence. It explained the contractor’s methods are the only ones available and it would not move someone out of a property for this issue. It said the resident still did not fully clear the required areas, such as under the bed, and advised him to wash bedding and cushions at 60 degrees. It apologised if the repairs team were aggressive on the phone and said it had fed back to the manager of the service.
8. When the resident initially contacted the Ombudsman, he wanted to be moved out of the property. He has since confirmed in March 2025 the issue is still ongoing and he wants to be moved out of the property either temporarily until the issue is resolved, or permanently.

Assessment and findings

Reports of bedbugs in the property

9. The landlord does not have a specific policy for pest control. However, on its website it says the resident is normally responsible for pest control in their home and the landlord is responsible for pest control in communal areas.
10. The landlord’s repairs policy says routine repairs will be completed within 20 working days.
11. On each occasion the resident reported bedbugs to the landlord on 11 September, 19 October and 23 November 2023 the landlord arranged for pest control contractors to attend within 5 calendar days. That was a reasonable action to take, considering its website says the resident is normally responsible for pest control in their home. It demonstrates the landlord was prepared to make reasonable efforts to address the issue.
12. According to the landlord’s records, the contractors told it they could not complete the required treatment to its maximum efficiency as the resident had not cleared the rooms as required. It is the Ombudsman’s view it would be unreasonable for the landlord to look into any other works before its contractors had the opportunity to implement a successful spray treatment.
13. It was appropriate for the landlord to provide further advice along with its stage 1 complaint response on 13 December 2023. It provided a bedbugs factsheet with information and guidance about the problem. It also made it clear how the resident would need to fully clear affected rooms to allow for effective treatment.
14. The landlord also emailed the resident on 13 December 2023 and asked him to confirm his availability for its pest control team to attend again on that same date. As the landlord only informed the resident of this in its email of the same date, the resident therefore had no opportunity to respond. This was a clear error by the landlord. However, it emailed him again on 18 December 2023 to ask when he would be available for the visit, which was reasonable.
15. The resident reported the bedbug issue to the landlord again on 4 January 2024. It arranged another appointment and asked him to clear all items from under his beds. The contractors attended on 11 January 2024 and completed another spray treatment of the property, which was within a reasonable timeframe.
16. Following the resident’s request to escalate his complaint on 22 January 2024, the landlord made further enquiries with its contractors. The pest control specialists told the landlord there was no other way of treating the property for bedbugs. They also said they did not see any live bedbugs on their latest visit, only signs of a previous infestation. They said the resident had again not cleared the rooms as requested and would not have been able to treat the area underneath the beds effectively. They also recommended not moving the resident out of the property as the treatment works better when the property is occupied. This adequately explains why the landlord has not considered his request for a move.
17. It was reasonable for the landlord to make further enquiries with the pest control specialists to inform its decisions. A landlord must rely on the opinions of appropriately qualified pest control professionals when deciding on appropriate action to take in these circumstances. As such, it was reasonable for it to base its stage 2 complaint response on the pest control experts’ information. It therefore did not uphold the complaint and did not give any further consideration to decanting the resident.
18. While it would have been undoubtedly distressing for the resident to find bedbugs bites on himself and his children despite the pest control service’s findings, the landlord’s response was fair in the circumstances.
19. In its final complaint response, the landlord apologised that the resident had experienced bedbugs in the home, but it did not acknowledge the error when trying to arrange the appointment of 13 December 2023. However, as it contacted him again on 18 December 2023, this error had a minimal impact.
20. Since there was no evidence of any continuing infestation at the time, nor was it identified where the bedbugs came from, the landlord responded reasonably based on the information it had. It is noted that, since the final response, there have been regular continuing visits by the pest control service to the property. Therefore, again there was no evidence of a failure by the landlord in its response.
21. Overall, there is no indication that the infestation occurred due to any failing on the part of the landlord. The evidence available shows that it took timely and appropriate action to address the matter in the resident’s home, outside of its obligations.
22. In summary, the landlord had arranged for contractors to attend the property each time the resident reported an issue. It did so even though its website says the resident is normally responsible for pest control in their home. The landlord also acted on the advice of appropriately qualified pest control professionals when deciding on what action to take. The noted error with dates in its email of 13 December 2023 had minimal impact overall.
23. Therefore, the Ombudsman considers there was there was no maladministration by the landlord in its handling of reports of bedbugs in the property.

Determination

24. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was no maladministration by the landlord in its handling of reports of bedbugs in the property.

Recommendations

25. The landlord should continue to address the resident’s new reports of bedbugs and engage with neighbouring properties to identify possible sources of infestation.