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Incommunities Limited (202310043)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202310043

Incommunities Limited

17 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 handling of the uncapping of the gas to the property when the resident moved in.

Background

  1. The resident occupies a 1-bedroom flat under a secure tenancy agreement, he is the sole tenant of the property. The landlord has recorded that the resident does not have any specific vulnerabilities.
  2. The resident signed the tenancy agreement with the landlord on 1 December 2022 and was scheduled to move in on 9 December 2022. The resident told this Service that the landlord said it would uncap the gas for the property on the same day he moved in.
  3. The resident complained to the landlord on 9 December 2022 that no-one had attended to uncap the gas. He stated he had been “sitting in a freezing cold house all day” and the landlord had moved the appointment to 10 December 2022 without his knowledge.
  4. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 12 January 2023. In this it:
    1. stated it had experienced an increased demand for gas repairs and it had not been able to attend the scheduled appointment on 9 December 2022 due to other work overrunning.
    2. accepted it failed to inform the resident that it would not be attending on 9 December 2022 and that the appointment had been moved to the following day. It apologised to the resident and told him it had reviewed its processes so customers are informed if a planned appointment cannot take place.
    3. noted that it had received an invoice for £1,431.38 from the resident’s representative (his son) for the missed appointment. The landlord told the resident it would not be paying this, and in line with its repair policy it would offer him £25 as compensation.
  5. The resident’s representative escalated the complaint on 19 January 2023, he stated that the compensation offered was not sufficient and the landlord should pay compensation in line with the invoice he submitted. What he stated he wanted as compensation consisted of:
    1. £200 for the cancelled appointment on 9 December 2022 and leaving the resident in an unheated property for 5 hours.
    2. £200 for not informing the resident that the operative on 10 December 2022 would not be attending before 12pm and leaving him in an unheated property for 4 hours.
    3. £500 for damages from the property being unheated over 2 days.
    4. £531.38 for his son’s and daughter’s loss of wages and travel costs.
  6. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 15 February 2023. In this it stated:
    1. it had originally arranged to uncap the gas at the property around 1.30pm on 9 December 2024. The landlord needed to reschedule this appointment to 1.30pm on 10 December 2022 due to other work overrunning. The landlord accepted it did not inform the resident the appointment had been rescheduled until he asked for an update and apologised for this.
    2. it attended on 10 December 2022 around 1.45pm and completed the work to uncap the gas for the property. The landlord said it did not consider the 15-minute delay constituted a missed appointment.
    3. it recognised that the resident did not have heating at the property for a 24-hour period and this would have caused stress to him, given this was during winter. It increased the compensation it offered to £50 but reiterated it would not pay the amount from the invoice as it considered its offer was appropriate in line with its repairs and compensation policies.
  7. The resident remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response and its decision not to provide the additional compensation requested. His representative escalated it to this Service.

Assessment and findings

  1. The landlord’s gas and heating policy states that it will cap off gas supplies to all properties when it is in possession of the property after it becomes void and a new resident is not moving in immediately. The landlord’s guide on lettable standards states that when the property is handed over to the tenant it will ensure that any gas appliances are serviced and tested.
  2. The landlord’s repair policy states:
    1. it is responsible for ensuring the proper working order for any installations for the supply of gas.
    2. it will carry out emergency repairs (which includes total or partial loss of gas supply) within 24 hours.
    3. it will ensure it attends for repairs at the agreed time. If the landlord is not able to it will contact the customer on the same day and re-arrange the appointment by mutual agreement.
    4. in terms of compensation where the landlord does not complete a qualifying repair in the prescribed period it will offer the lesser of:
      1. £50.
      2. £10 + (£2 x N), where N equals the number of days the landlord exceeded the timescales of the policy.
  3. From the available evidence although the resident signed the tenancy agreement on 1 December 2022 he was not scheduled to move in until 9 December 2022. As such the landlord’s decision to cap the gas at the property was appropriate as it was consistent with its gas and heating policy.
  4. From the resident’s account he arrived at the property around 12pm on 9 December 2022, with the expectation that the landlord would uncap the gas that afternoon. The landlord recorded that the resident contacted it around 3pm for an update and it told him was still planning to attend. This was reasonable as we have not seen any evidence that the landlord believed it would not be able to uncap the gas at the property as agreed.
  5. At 4pm on 9 December 2022 the landlord changed the appointment for uncapping the gas to 10 December 2022. The landlord recorded the resident contacted it for an update at 5pm on 9 December 2022 and it told him that it would not be attending that day. The resident left the property following this call. This was a failing by the landlord. In line with its repair policy, the landlord should have told the resident that it was not attending and re-arranged a new appointment with him at the time that it knew it would not be able to make the scheduled appointment.
  6. The resident told this Service the landlord said it would attend between 8am and 8pm on 10 December 2022 so he arrived at the property at 8am. However, he stated that when the landlord’s operative arrived he was told that they did not start work until 12pm so he had arrived 4 hours early unnecessarily. The Ombudsman has not seen any evidence of that conversation for us to reach a view on what the resident was told and if this was reasonable.
  7. The landlord attended at 1.45pm on 10 December 2022 and completed the work to uncap the gas at 2.30pm. Considered against the landlord’s repair policy the timescales of its response were reasonable as it resolved the lack of gas supply within 24 hours of the time that it told the resident it would complete this work. Though it would have been ideal for the landlord to have uncapped the gas supply on the same day the resident planned to move in we recognise that it is not always possible for a landlord to attend a scheduled appointment. We have seen that the landlord rescheduled this appointment as an appropriate priority for an emergency repair, even if there was a failure in how the landlord communicated this.
  8. The resident’s representative told this service that he wanted the landlord to apologise to his father, make service improvements and pay compensation in line with the invoice submitted. In the Ombudsman’s view the actions the landlord has taken are appropriate to put right the failings we have seen. This is because:
    1. the landlord has already apologised for the failure to inform the resident that it needed to reschedule the appointment to uncap the gas. The apology given is consistent with the principles set out in the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies and it would not be proportionate to require the landlord to apologise again for the same failing.
    2. as part of the landlord’s response it acknowledged the service failing, explained why this happened and what action it had taken to prevent this from reoccurring. In the Ombudsman’s view the learning the landlord took from this failing was relevant to what had happened and proportionate to the impact this had on the resident.
    3. regarding the financial remedy:
      1. in line with our guidance on remedies, we would not ordinarily order that a landlord reimburses someone for time off work for repairs. In addition, as the resident is the sole tenant of the property, he is the only person involved who has a landlord/tenant relationship with the landlord for the purposes of paragraph 25.a. of the Scheme. As such our investigation is only considering the impact of the landlord’s failing on the resident, rather than his representative or other members of his family.
      2. the duration of the impact of the failing was short, as the landlord informed the resident it had rescheduled the appointment around an hour after it made this decision. In line with annex A of our guidance on remedies the £900 the resident requested for this aspect of the complaint would not be proportionate as there is no evidence that the landlord’s failing had a significant impact on him, or that it had an ongoing physical or emotional impact. In the Ombudsman’s view the impact of the failing seen would be consistent with that of a service failure and the landlord’s offer of £50 is appropriate to remedy that.
      3. we recognise the resident was 65 at the time of the events complained about and that this took place during winter, which would have made the lack of heating more noticeable and uncomfortable. However, as explained above the failing was over a relatively short time period and we have not seen any evidence that the resident had any individual circumstances that would have made him significantly more affected by the impact of the landlord’s failing. Therefore, in line with our guidance for remedies, the Ombudsman’s view is that there are no aggravating factors that would justify increasing the financial remedy.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53.b. of the Scheme there was reasonable redress by the landlord in its handling of the uncapping of the gas at the property.

Recommendation

  1. The Ombudsman recommends that the landlord pay the resident the £50 it previously offered if it has not already done so.