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Clarion Housing Association Limited (202231388)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202231388

Clarion Housing Association Limited

24 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 handling of repairs to the resident’s toilet.
  2. The Ombudsman has also considered the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant in a 2 bedroom property. She lives in the property with another adult and her child.
  2. The resident raised her complaint on 14 December 2022 with the landlord. She told it that she had no working usable toilet since 12 December 2022. Her family had to take alternative measures as a result. She raised concerns with its lack of communication and its service provision. She said it had been over 48 hours with no toilet, and it was both unhygienic and unsanitary.
  3. The resident followed up with her complaint on 22 December 2022 with a summary and said she made 26 phone calls to the landlord. She raised concerns with its communication again and its actions around the issue. The landlord acknowledged the complaint on 28 December 2022.The resident chased her complaint between January 2023 and February 2023.
  4. The landlord provided its stage 1 response on 8 February 2023 and explained its actions between 12 December 2022 and 15 December 2022. It acknowledged it had taken 3 days to complete the works, but it was not a straightforward unblocking of the toilet as it needed specialist input. It apologised for the inconvenience, assured her it took her complaint seriously and learned from its failures. It found a service failure with its complaint handing and offered compensation of £150. It broke this down as £50 for the delay in its response, and £100 for the inconvenience caused around the repair.
  5. The resident remained dissatisfied and escalated her complaint on 9 February 2023. She said she paid an extremely high amount of rent and felt let down by the service received. She reiterated the amount of calls she made and said she wasted time waiting at home for missed appointments. She told the landlord that the situation was unpleasant and embarrassing when the toilet broke as she had personal issues which made the situation even more unsanitary. She did not believe its compensation offer justified the embarrassment and upset caused. She wanted the situation reviewed further.
  6. The resident chased her complaint on 21 February 2023 and the landlord acknowledged it on 28 February 2023. In its acknowledgement it said it would provide its response within 20 working days.
  7. The landlord provided its stage 2 response on 3 March 2023. It said it assessed its repair logs and could not see any missed appointments. It could see that she called it and said she had an appointment arranged for the repairs on 15 December 2022. It explained it would not have attended the appointment as there was an appointment previously scheduled to resolve the issue, and it could not do so as it needed a specialist. It apologised she was without a toilet for 3 days and for the stress and inconvenience. It awarded added compensation of £74 for the lack of sanitation provision as outlined in its policy.
  8. The resident contacted the Ombudsman on 8 September 2023. She told us she did not feel that the landlord took her complaint seriously. It left her young family including a female with no toilet facilities for “4 days”. She said she wanted further compensation and wanted it to take full responsibility for what it had done.

Assessment and findings

Repairs to the resident’s toilet

  1. The landlord runs 2 repair priorities. Emergency repairs which its policy says it will attend to within 24 hours, and non-emergency repairs which it offered at residents’ convenience. It says it will respond to these within 28 days of the repair report.
  2. The landlord’s repair records show that following the resident’s reports it raised emergency repairs on 12 December 2022. It also raised further emergency jobs on 13 and 14 December 2022. Its records show that it appropriately attended to these reports within its policy timeframes. Its records also do not show that there were any missed appointments.
  3. The landlord also raised a routine repair on 13 December 2022 which it reported in its response that it competed on 15 December 2022. However, its repair logs state that it completed the works on 19 December 2022. Regardless of this, however, it completed the repairs within the timeframes within its policy.
  4. Section 10 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 sets out the criteria in which a property is unfit for Human Habitation. One of these is around issues with the drainage or lavatories. Government guidance around the criteria for Fitness for Human Habitation uses the example of a property where there are no plumbed sanitary conveniences in the property as an unfit property.
  5. Given this, the landlord has not demonstrated that it considered whether the property remained habitable for the family and this was unreasonable. This was especially important as there was a child in the property whilst it completed the repairs. It has not shown that it considered alternative methods such as temporary accommodation. However, it later acknowledged that it failed to take appropriate consideration around the sanitation in the property and provision of alternative facilities. Whilst this does not directly consider the habitation of the property, we believe its acknowledgment shows it realised it did not take the necessary considerations.
  6. The landlord’s compensation policy breaks its awards down into 3 categories. Awards of £50 to £250 where there has been a service failure resulting in some impact on the resident, £250 to £700 where there is considerable failure, but no permanent impact on the resident, and over £700 where there has been a severe long term impact on the resident. The policy also says it may offer an amount equal to 100% rent where there are no sanitation provisions.
  7. The landlord’s offer of £174 falls within the first category and we believe this was appropriate for the delays and distress caused over the period. Although it did not offer the resident any redress in relation to the rent, its offer of compensation exceeds the amount of compensation payable through a rent calculation. This is because the rent calculation over the period of days the family were without a toilet amounts to £116.28.
  8. In summary, the landlord completed the repairs within the necessary timescales. It acknowledged that there were failings in its handling of the matter as it did not consider the inconvenience to the family, lack of sanitation or provide alternative facilities. Although it did not directly consider the habitability of the property, it recognised its failings around the lack of consideration around sanitation. It offered compensation because of its failings, and we find this to be reasonable. Based on this the Ombudsman finds that there was reasonable redress.

Complaint handling

  1. The landlord operated a 2 stage complaints process. It said it would acknowledge and log a complaint within 10 working days and aimed to respond to stage 1 complaints within 20 working days. This was due to a cyber-attack which affected its service provision. It aimed to respond at stage 2 within 40 working days. Where it was unable to do so, it would provide the reasons for the decision and manage expectations. If needed it would provide an action plan (at stage 1) outlining what it intended to do and if possible, a timeline on when it would provide a full response.
  2. The resident raised her complaint on 14 December 2022, as such a response was due by 16 January 2023. The landlord provided its response on 8 February 2023, representing a delay of 13 working days. This was unreasonable and saw the resident taking the time to requests updates on her complaint. The landlord however acknowledged the delay in its complaint handling and offered the resident £50 compensation.
  3. The resident then escalated her complaint as she remained dissatisfied. The landlord acknowledged the escalation on 28 February 2023, 3 working days outside of its policy and was inappropriate. There is however no evidence that the delay caused the resident any detriment.
  4. The landlord also told the resident in its stage 2 acknowledgement that it would provide its response 20 working days earlier than its policy said it would. It appropriately met the expectation that it had created with the resident. It provided its response earlier than the 20 working days from the date of escalation.
  5. In summary, there were delays in the landlord’s complaint handling which it acknowledged and compensated the resident for within its response. It delayed in its acknowledgement of the stage 2 response but provided its response earlier than the date in both its policy and acknowledgement of the complaint. The Ombudsman considers that the landlord’s offer of redress was reasonable for the delay. As such, we find that there was reasonable redress with the landlord’s complaint handling.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53b of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was reasonable redress with the landlord’s:
    1. Handling of repairs to the resident’s toilet.
    2. Complaint handling.

Recommendations

  1. Pay the resident compensation of £174 offered across its responses if it remains outstanding.
  2. If it remains outstanding, pay the resident £50 for its complaint handling failing.