Camden Council (202303779)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202303779

Camden Council

24 January 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 response to the resident’s request for a parking space.
2. The Ombudsman has also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

3. The resident holds a secure tenancy of the property. His tenancy began on 17 May 2021. He applied for a parking space on his estate on 3 June 2021.
4. The resident complained to the landlord on 18 October 2021, in which he said:
   1. He has applied for a parking permit and was added to a waiting list that will take a long time. It is unfair others have a permit and he does not. Some residents do not use their cars for months at a time, whilst he needs to use his car every day.
   2. The landlord must look at how it allocates spaces and be more transparent in its allocation process. He wants the landlord to issue him a space.
   3. He is having difficulty contacting the resident parking team.
5. On 9 January 2023 the resident contacted the landlord advising he had not received a response to his complaint. It emailed him saying it had sent a complaint response on 7 July 2022 and attached a copy. The response stated:
   1. Records show the resident applied for a parking space on 3 June 2021. The reference number of the application was: 440107.
   2. It apologised it had not provided an update pointing out that its website clearly states the landlord will only contact residents when a space becomes available.
   3. It has not contacted the resident as no parking spaces are available. Once a space becomes available the landlord will contact him.
   4. There is a waiting list on the street and the resident is number 5 on the list.
   5. The landlord provided a telephone number and email address for a dedicated officer in the parking team.
   6. The landlord did not uphold the complaint as it felt the estate parking team had followed the procedures, which are clearly publicised on its website.
6. He escalated his complaint the same day. He said he was not happy to be on the waiting list for so long and thought he should have priority over people not living on the estate. The landlord acknowledged the stage 2 escalation in an email on 10 January 2023.
7. The resident emailed the landlord on 16 May 2023, highlighting that he had not received a response to his stage 2 complaint. It issued the stage 2 response on   22 May 2023, which included the following information:
   1. The resident states that there is a problem with contacting the parking team, there is no online form, or email address to contact them and would like this investigated.
   2. The landlord provided a telephone number and email address for a dedicated officer in the parking team.
   3. It had not contacted the resident as there are no spaces available. There is a long waiting list for the area he lives in.
   4. It did not uphold the complaint because the landlord felt officers had followed the correct procedure.
8. The resident brought his complaint to this Service on 16 August 2023.
   1. The resident is concerned about the lack of clearly defined criteria, transparency and ambiguity of the process.
   2. He is unhappy with the time the landlord has taken to respond to his complaint and that the same officer issued both complaint responses.

Assessment and findings

Request for a parking space.

9. The landlord’s policy on requesting a parking space is listed on its website. It states:
   1. Residents can apply to rent a parking space on one of its housing estates.
   2. It prioritises applications and allocates spaces as follows:
      1. Blue badge holders who reside on the estate take highest priority.
      2. Tenants and leaseholders on the estate.
      3. Tenants and leaseholders on neighbouring estates.
      4. Council staff, businesses and non-Camden residents.
10. The landlord has reported that there is no additional policy on allocations other than the information on the website. It simply allocates on the priority basis listed above. The resident was dissatisfied that the landlord had not contacted him in relation to his application for a parking space. However, it makes no commitment to keeping applicants up to date. The website states the following:
    1. If no spaces are available when a resident applies, their name will be added to a waiting list. The landlord will contact applicants once a space becomes available. 
11. Whilst the landlord has complied with its published information. This Service believes the landlord’s procedure is problematic and delivers a poor level of customer service. The procedure does not provide any time limit between making an application and being allocated a space. This means a resident could be waiting for an indefinite amount of time without any update. In this case it is already over 2 years. It is unreasonable of the landlord to expect a resident to make an application and have to wait years without any feedback on its progress. There should be a mechanism that allows applicants to receive updates on at least an annual basis. There is service failure in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for a parking space.
12. As part of his complaint the resident raised the difficulty he was having contacting the parking team. In both complaint responses the landlord provided a telephone number and email address for a designated parking officer. However, the resident informs this service that emails to the address do not get answered. The resident has not provided copies of the emails he sent, which prevents the Ombudsman making a finding on this complaint point.

Complaint handling

13. The landlord operates a 3 stage complaints procedure, where the third stage is a referral to the Ombudsman. It aims to acknowledge stage 1 and 2 complaints within 5 working days and provide responses within 10 and 20 working days respectively. The landlord says it will contact the resident to ensure it has listened and understood the query and to agree what it is going to do. It also commits to informing residents of the name of the person or team dealing with the complaint and letting them know when a response will be ready.
14. The landlord has not submitted evidence to show that it acknowledged the stage 1 complaint. It also failed to contact the resident to discuss the complaint and agree how it was going to be dealt with. The resident contacted the landlord on 9 January 2023 asking why he had not had a response to his complaint. It advised it had sent its reply to him on 7 July 2022 and provided a copy. The resident disputes he received the complaint response. Whilst the landlord has provided a dated copy of the stage 1 response to this Service. There is no proof of postage or email demonstrating it actually sent the letter. Unlike the stage 2 response, where it provided the email to which the letter was attached. However, the period from the complaint being logged to the response being provided was 181 working days, which is completely unreasonable.
15. The resident escalated his request on 9 January 2023 and received an acknowledgement email the next day. He emailed the landlord on 16 May 2023 advising he had still not had a response. On 18 May 2023 it responded attaching the original stage 1 complaint response. He sent an email to say he had already seen this response. It then forwarded a stage 2 response on 22 May 2023. This was 72 working days beyond the target date.
16. The resident believed the same person responded to his stage 1 and stage 2 complaint. However, the complaint response letters are both signed by different people, indicating there were different individuals involved in the investigations at each stage.
17. The landlord failed to comply with the requirements of its own complaints policy. It did not acknowledge the stage 1 complaint and did not contact the resident to listen and ensure it understood what his complaint was about. It did not tell him who was dealing with his complaint or confirm when the response would be ready. There were excessive and unacceptable delays in responding to both stages of the complaint. It did not write to the resident at any point in the process to advise there would be a delay or to request further time to respond. Neither of the complaint responses referred to, or apologised, for the delays. Overall, the landlord’s complaint handling failures amount to maladministration.

Determination

18. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for a parking space.
19. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s complaint handling.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

20. Within four weeks of the date of this report the landlord must:
    1. Pay the resident £300 compensation for the distress and inconvenience caused by its complaint handling.
    2. The landlord must provide the resident with a written apology from a senior member of the organisation for the delays in its complaint handling.
21. Within 12 weeks of this report the landlord must carry out a review of the resident’s complaint to determine what action it should take to prevent the same complaint handling failures occurring in the future.
22. The landlord must provide this Service with evidence of compliance with the above orders within the timeframes set out.

Recommendations

23. The landlord should create a process that will keep residents updated on their application. This should include clarification on the progress of their application. It should provide the update annually as a minimum.  Or alternatively, create an online mechanism, which provides the same information that residents are able to check themselves.