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Derby City Council (202214347)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202214347

Derby City Council

29 May 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 antisocial behaviour (ASB).

Background

  1. The resident has been a secure tenant at the property, which is a 1-bedroom first floor flat, since 25 January 2016. The landlord’s housing management system has no vulnerabilities recorded for the resident. However, the landlord said she was vulnerable when compiling papers for legal action against her neighbour.
  2. The resident first reported ASB by her neighbour in January 2021. She said that the neighbour was banging on the walls, playing loud music, running, jumping, and watching TV during the night. She initially reported incidents every few days.
  3. In approximately June 2022 she complained to the landlord about how its staff had handled her reports of ASB. It provided 2 complaint responses and advised her that she could bring the case to this Service for investigation if she remained dissatisfied, but she did not approach us at that time.
  4. The landlord obtained a 1-year civil injunction against the neighbour on 15 December 2022. The neighbour breached the injunction several times, once by shouting directly at the resident in the presence of another neighbour. Therefore, the landlord began court proceedings in February 2023. On 2 March 2023 a directions hearing took place. Following this the defence requested various adjournments including allowing time for the completion of a psychiatric report. The judge gave 10 weeks for this to be completed. In September 2023 the parties agreed an order that the neighbour would undertake a managed move to a different property within 3 months, as long as the property matched certain criteria.
  5. The resident complained on 3 October 2023. She said that:
    1. She was shocked by the decision made in the court and felt that the neighbour had not being punished for his actions over many years.
    2. She felt that she was being treated as a witness rather than a victim.
    3. A staff member had been unable to answer her questions after the court case and said she would need to discuss them with her team.
    4. She felt the ASB team lied and played games.
  6. The landlord acknowledged the stage 1 complaint on 4 October 2023 and responded on 18 October 2023. It confirmed that it had met the resident on 16 October 2023 and they had agreed to focus on the outcomes she wanted which were:
    1. For the neighbour to quickly move as far away as possible.
    2. The ASB department to take the neighbour to court to be punished for their crimes.
  7. The landlord confirmed their discussion explaining that:
    1. It accepted that it had been a difficult and distressing time for the resident and apologised that it had not met her expectations. However, there were limitations in what it could do and some of the issues she raised were out of its control as they were connected to the criminal justice system.
    2. It had worked closely with agencies and legal representatives to secure the judgement made on 29 September 2023, when the neighbour admitted that they had breached the injunction.
    3. It understood why she felt she had been referred to as a witness and not treated as a victim. However, it reassured her that in its discussions with legal representatives it had placed an onus on her being a victim and it had pursued an outcome that was victim centred.
    4. It would expediate the move and prioritise finding alternative accommodation for the neighbour well within the 3 months.
    5. It would continue to monitor any ongoing ASB and take action as necessary.
    6. She would have a named officer to contact to discuss any further issues.
  8. The resident asked the landlord to escalate the complaint to stage 2 of the complaints process on 24 October 2023. She said she was still dissatisfied with the court case outcome and she did not have a full copy of the court paperwork because the landlord had redacted it.
  9. The landlord acknowledged the stage 2 complaint on 26 October 2023 and responded on 23 November 2023. It said that:
    1. It was continuing to work with the neighbour to facilitate a move. However, the demand for social housing was greater than the supply.
    2. The neighbour had admitted breaches of the injunction which negated the need for a hearing. The judge had made an order having read all the witness statements.
    3. It could not share the complete court order as it contained personal data about the neighbour.
  10. The landlord has informed us that the resident stopped working with it following this decision up until July 2024. It sourced 4 alternative properties for the neighbour. However, the police decided that 2 of them were unsuitable. The neighbour declined the other 2 as he did not consider that they met the specified criteria.
  11. The landlord served a notice of seeking possession on the neighbour on 22 March 2024. It obtained an interim injunction with a power of arrest on 11 April 2024. On 6 August 2024 the courts granted a 12-month suspended possession order which stated that the neighbour must not commit ASB or breach the injunction order.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident previously complained about the landlord’s handling of ASB reports in 2021. Although this provides historical context to the issues experienced in this case, we have not considered the landlord’s response to the residents reports of ASB leading to that complaint. This is because the resident did not ask us to investigate this and because we would not be able to make robust findings for this period. This is in accordance with the Scheme. Therefore, our investigation has focussed on the landlord’s actions after it obtained an injunction in December 2022 which was prior to the resident’s complaint of October 2023.
  2. Some information provided by the landlord and resident concerned activity that occurred beyond the final stage 2 complaint response. This is therefore beyond the scope of this investigation. Where we have referenced this, it is for information only and we have not considered it in the determination or orders.

ASB

  1. It is not our role to determine whether the nuisance the resident reported amounted to ASB. It is also not our role to determine whether any ASB took place. Our role in such cases is to consider the evidence available to determine whether the landlord acted reasonably, and in accordance with its policies and procedures, in response to the reports made.
  2. The Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 introduced the ASB community trigger, or case review. When a resident requests a review, and the local threshold criteria is met, the relevant bodies should undertake the review. ASB statutory guidance says that the review threshold should be, at a maximum, when a resident has made 3 reports of ASB within 6 months.
  3. The landlord’s ASB policy states that it will promote and facilitate the ASB review process on behalf of vulnerable customers, or where it feels it is required.
  4. In this case the threshold for a referral for an ASB case review was met before she complained. However, we have seen no evidence that the landlord promoted or facilitated the ASB review process. It would have been reasonable for the landlord to supply this information in its complaint responses, but it did not. There is evidence that the landlord tried to refer the case for review itself in January 2024 after receiving another determination by the Ombudsman on a similar case. However, it should have highlighted the process to the resident at an earlier stage. This was particularly relevant as she had expressed dissatisfaction with the way it was handling the case. This would have enabled her to make an informed decision on whether to request a review and may have alleviated some of her distress with the situation.
  5. In the stage 1 complaint response the landlord told the resident that it would place a priority on securing alternative accommodation for the neighbour “well within” the 3 months stipulated in the court order. However, in the stage 2 complaint response it pointed out the scarcity of social housing and the problems with rehousing the neighbour quickly. The landlord therefore initially failed to manage the resident’s expectations regarding the amount of time it might take to rehouse the neighbour. This error cost her time and trouble because she contacted the landlord several times for an update.
  6. The landlord supplied noise monitoring equipment to the resident and took relevant legal action to try to resolve the issues she reported. Considering the circumstances of the case some options available were not appropriate, for example mediation or an acceptable behaviour contract. It maintained communication with the resident throughout the process and there is evidence that it continued to try to communicate with her when she disengaged with it. It made referrals to local victim support services and there is evidence that it consulted with other agencies including the police.
  7. While we understand the resident’s frustration and dissatisfaction due to the delays in the process, many of the delays experienced during the period covered by this investigation were due to circumstances outside the landlord’s control. These included lengthy adjournments during the court process. Decisions made by the court were also outside the landlord’s control, including the decision to try to rehouse the neighbour. The landlord was also restricted in the actions it could take due to the neighbour’s personal circumstances.
  8. Overall, due to the landlord’s failure to provide adequate information about the community trigger and its failure to manage the resident’s expectations, there was service failure in it’s handling of her reports of ASB. We have therefore ordered it to pay her £75 to reflect the time, trouble, and distress this caused. This is in accordance with the Housing Ombudsman’s remedies guidance.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the residents reports of ASB.

Orders

  1. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report the landlord must apologise to the resident in writing for the errors identified.
  2. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report the landlord must pay £75 compensation directly to the resident to reflect the time, trouble, and distress caused by the errors in its handling of her reports of ASB.
  3. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report the landlord must contact the resident to find out her current vulnerabilities. It should ensure that all its systems are updated to reflect these so that it can consider appropriate adjustments to the services it provides.
  4. The landlord must provide the Ombudsman with evidence of compliance with these orders by the above deadlines.

Recommendation

  1. One of the errors in this case was similar to that identified in case 202212102 in which the landlord was ordered to provide guidance to staff on the importance of considering an ASB case review. It has demonstrated compliance with this order. As the actions taken in this case occurred prior to this order we have not duplicated this. We recommend that the landlord considers whether there are any additional issues arising from this later case that require further action.