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Futures Housing Group Limited (202308956)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202308956

Futures Housing Group Limited

18 December 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 partner’s concerns about the conduct of its contractor.

Determination

  1. When a complaint is brought to the Ombudsman, we must consider all the circumstances of the case as there are sometimes reasons why a complaint will not be investigated.
  2. After carefully considering all the evidence, this Service has determined that the complaint, as set out above, is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.

Summary of Events

  1. The resident is the sole secure tenant of the landlord which is a housing association. The tenancy commenced on 25 January 2016. The resident occupies the property with her partner who is named as an occupier on the tenancy agreement.
  2. On 27 March 2023 the landlord attended the property to carry out a repair to the bathroom extractor fan. On the same day the resident’s partner emailed the landlord to complain that one of the operatives had urinated in the bath and that they had dumped waste down the toilet.
  3. Also on 27 March 2023 the contractor submitted an incident alert to the landlord. The form said that the resident’s partner had threatened to “deck” the operatives.
  4. On 12 April 2023 the landlord issued the resident with a tenancy warning letter due to her partner’s behaviour towards its contractor. It also confirmed that it had added an alert to its system that visits to the property should be made in pairs.
  5. The landlord provided its stage 1 complaint response on 12 April 2023. It acknowledged that waste had fallen into the toilet during the work and that it would not flush. It upheld that part of the complaint. It also said that it had reminded its operatives to carry a bucket, dustpan and brush to be able to remove waste from site.
  6. The resident’s partner was dissatisfied with the landlord’s response and escalated his complaint to stage 2 on 24 April 2023.
  7. The landlord issued its final response on 12 May 2023. It said that during a discussion with the resident’s partner on 3 May he was unhappy with information it had provided about his inclusion on its incident register. It set out the reasons for its decision. The resident’s partner had also requested that the operatives did not attend his home to carry out any repairs in future. The landlord confirmed it had added a notification to the account.

Reasons

  1. Paragraph 25.a. of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme states that “The following people can make complaints to the Ombudsman about members: a) a person who is or has been in a landlord/tenant relationship with a member. This includes people who have a lease, tenancy, licence to occupy, service agreement or other arrangement to occupy premises owned or managed by a member.
  2. The resident’s partner does not have a landlord/tenant relationship with a member. The resident has not provided consent for her partner to raise a complaint on her behalf.
  3. Paragraph 25.a. of the Scheme outlined above, is a mandatory ground for accepting complaints within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. The complaint was raised by the resident’s partner who is not in a landlord/tenant relationship with the member. The complaint, as defined above, is therefore not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.