From 13 January 2026, we will no longer accept new cases by email. Please use our online webform to submit your complaint. This helps us respond to you more quickly.

Need help? Call us on 0300 111 3000

Clarion Housing Association Limited (202331458)

Back to Top

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202331458

Clarion Housing Association Limited

20 March 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 response to the resident’s:
    1. Service charge queries.
    2. Associated formal complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is a shared owner of the property, a 1-bedroom flat. The landlord is a housing association.
  2. The landlord wrote to the resident on 20 September 2023 providing her with a breakdown of her service charges for the financial year 2022/23. The resident queried the charges and the landlord acknowledged this on 2 October 2023.
  3. In the absence of a further response from the landlord, the resident made a complaint on 31 October 2023. She requested a response about the door entry and refuse collection charges being higher than the estimated costs, and asked what the day-to-day repair charges were for.
  4. In the landlord’s stage 1 response of 8 December 2023 it said:
    1. It apologised for the delay in responding and offered £100 compensation.
    2. The resident did not receive clear communication from the service charge team. It apologised for its delay and offered £100 compensation for this.
    3. The resident had been overcharged for her door entry service charge and refuse collection and an adjustment had been applied to her account to rectify this. It awarded £150 compensation for its errors in calculating the service charges.
  5. On 12 December 2023 the resident escalated her complaint to stage 2. She remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response to the refuse collection part of her service charge. She reported that the amount she had been charged remained higher than previous years. Additionally, she identified another discrepancy about her door entry charge for 2021/22. She wanted to know what her monthly direct debit would be amended to following the adjustments to her service charges.
  6. In the landlord’s stage 2 response of 30 January 2024 it said:
    1. It was sorry for the delay in responding to her complaint at stage 2.
    2. The door entry charge for 2021/22 had been incorrect. It applied credit to the resident’s account to rectify this error and awarded an additional £50 compensation for this.
    3. The amended refuse collection charges were correct. It was higher than usual due to a fly tipping incident.
  7. In the resident’s referral to us in February 2024 she said she remained dissatisfied that the landlord had not confirmed when the new monthly direct debit amount would be applied. To resolve the complaint, she wants her question answered.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. Following the landlord’s final response, the resident raised new queries about her service charges which had not been through the landlord’s complaints process. Additionally, she requested information about fly tipping on the estate. We have not seen evidence that these matters have exhausted the landlord’s internal complaints process. Therefore, we have not considered these matters as part of this investigation.

Service charge queries

  1. The landlord’s guidance on service charges sets out that an annual certificate of actual expenditure will be issued which compares estimated contributions for the preceding year with the actual costs incurred during that year. Any variance as a result of this comparison (surplus/deficit) will be applied to the shared owner’s accounts.
  2. The landlord issued the resident a year end certificate of actual expenditure for her service charges for 2022/23. The resident advised us that she initially contacted the landlord with service charge queries on 28 September 2023, although we have not seen evidence of this contact. However, the landlord wrote to the resident on 2 October 2023 acknowledging her enquiry and advising it would respond within a couple of weeks.
  3. It is not disputed that there were delays in the landlord responding to the resident’s queries about her service charges. The resident incurred time and trouble chasing it for updates and was referred to different teams. She ultimately received a response within the landlord’s complaint response of 8 December 2023, more than 2 months after the queries were raised.
  4. The landlord carried out internal enquiries with the service charge team to investigate what had caused these delays. This was appropriate given it had fallen outside of its service level agreement timescales. The service charge team advised that due to the high volume of enquiries received, it had taken the team longer than anticipated to respond. In these circumstances, the landlord should have contacted the resident to update her on the delays. Instead, she remained unclear when she would receive a response and was directed to different teams. This likely caused frustration and inconvenience to the resident.
  5. It was therefore appropriate that upon investigating the complaint, the landlord acknowledged its failings and outlined the cause of its poor communication. It apologised that its communication had fallen below the expected standard and offered £100 compensation for its failings. Additionally, it informed the resident that the service charge manager had discussed the matters with their team to prevent a reoccurrence of these issues. We consider these remedies to be fair and proportionate to put things right for the landlord’s poor communication with the resident in this case. 
  6. The landlord investigated and responded to all aspects of the resident’s queries in its stage 1 response. It included repair invoices which set out the costs to justify her service charges for the repairs. It identified that it had overcharged the resident for the door entry and refuse collection parts of her service charges. It was appropriate that the landlord included records from its systems to evidence the actual charges and the breakdown of this. 
  7. The landlord noted that the resident had been incorrectly charged £149.72 per annum rather than £11.05 which was the correct actual charge for the door entry. In relation to the refuse collection, the resident had been charged £55.75 per annum rather than the correct actual charge of £16.26. These errors likely caused inconvenience to the resident.
  8. Where there has been a landlord failing, our role is to consider whether the landlord took appropriate steps to put things right for the resident. In this case, the landlord identified that it had previously adjusted the door entry overcharge in November 2023. Additionally, it amended the refuse collection element of the resident’s service charge to reflect the correct amount. It was reasonable for the landlord to confirm it had rectified the errors and offer £150 compensation for the impact caused to the resident.
  9. Within its final response, the landlord responded to the resident’s further queries about her service charges. It agreed that she had been overcharged for the door entry service in 2021/22 and confirmed it applied a credit of £47.26 to her account to rectify this. Further, a compensation award of £50 was applied for this error. This was proportionate to the identified failing.
  10. The resident was dissatisfied that the refuse collection charge remained high, and she felt this was still incorrect. The landlord provided a full explanation about the cause of the increase as requested. It included invoices of refuse collection from fly tipping incidents and explained that these incidents had caused the increased service charge. The landlord’s response to her concern was appropriate.
  11. Within the resident’s complaint, she asked the landlord to inform her what her new direct debit for her service charges would be. The landlord failed to respond to this aspect of the complaint. However, it did advise her throughout the complaints process that her service charge account had been rectified to correct the errors. The resident did not dispute this, or the amount reimbursed throughout the complaints process. The landlord reimbursed the resident’s account in line with its service charge procedure. 
  12. Although the landlord did not respond to this specific request, the failing is not reflective of a finding of service failure. We appreciate that the lack of response to this part of the complaint is likely to have caused her frustration. Therefore, the landlord is recommended to contact the resident to enquire whether she would still like clarification about her direct debit payments for her service charges. If so, it should provide her with this information.
  13. Overall, the landlord clearly responded to the resident’s queries about her service charges, identified where it had miscalculated the charges, and applied credit to rectify her service charge account. Although there were failings in the landlord’s response to the resident’s queries about her service charges, particularly in its communication, it took proportionate action to put things right for the resident. The landlord’s complaint responses were detailed and apologetic, and the level of compensation offered was suitable to reflect the errors in its handling of the case. Therefore, there was reasonable redress in the landlord’s response to the resident’s service charge queries.

Complaint handling

  1. The landlord’s complaints procedure sets out 2 stages. At stage 1 it will aim to issue a full response to the complaint within 10 working days. If it requires additional time, it will agree this with the resident and not exceed a further 10 working days. At stage 2 it will aim to provide a final response within 20 working days.
  2. There were delays in the landlord responding at both stages of the complaints process. It failed to provide updates to the resident when it exceeded its target timeframes at stage 1. However, at stage 2 it wrote to the resident on 2 occasions to inform her of the delays and to extend its deadline.
  3. The landlord identified in its stage 1 response that it delayed issuing its response and apologised for this. At stage 2, the landlord issued its response 35 working days after the resident asked for her complaint to be escalated. Although these delays were not significant, they would have caused inconvenience to the resident. Nonetheless, it was appropriate that within its final response, the landlord apologised again for its delays and explained that this was due to a high level of customer contact.
  4. The landlord offered £100 compensation for its delayed stage 1 response. Taking into account the landlord’s responses and apology, we find the redress offered to be proportionate to the minor failings identified in the landlord’s complaint handling. Therefore, there was reasonable redress in relation to the landlord’s complaint handling in this case.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53.b of the Scheme there was reasonable redress offered in relation to the landlord’s handling of the resident’s:
    1. Service charge queries.
    2. Associated formal complaint.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord is recommended to:
    1. If it has not already done so, pay the resident £400 as already offered throughout its complaints process. This is comprised of:
      1. £200 for the inconvenience caused by the service charge errors (£150 offered at stage 1 and £50 offered at stage 2).
      2. £100 to account for the landlord’s poor communication with the resident in response to her service charge queries (as offered at stage 1).
      3. £100 to account for the landlord’s delays to respond to her complaint (as offered at stage 1). 
    2. Contact the resident to ask whether she still requires clarification about her direct debit payments for her service charges. If so, it should provide this information to the resident within 4 weeks.