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Islington Council (202225667)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202225667

Islington Council

20 May 2024


Our approach

What we can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction and is governed by the Housing Ombudsman Scheme. The Ombudsman must determine whether a complaint comes within their jurisdiction. The Ombudsman seeks to resolve disputes wherever possible but cannot investigate complaints that fall outside of this. 

In deciding whether a complaint falls within their jurisdiction, the Ombudsman will carefully consider all the evidence provided by the parties and the circumstances of the case.

The complaint

  1. The resident’s complaint is about the estate charges he has been billed for by the landlord.

Determination (jurisdictional decision)

  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.

 

  1. After carefully considering all the evidence, I have determined that the complaint, as set out above, is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.

Summary of events

  1. The resident is a freeholder of a property on one of the landlord’s estates. The deed of transfer sets out that he must contribute to a proportion of the landlord’s costs of maintaining the estate, through an estate charge.
  2. The resident has disputed that he should have to pay for certain items billed by the landlord, arguing that he does not derive “benefit” from them. The landlord has issued stage 1 and 2 complaint responses to the resident.

Reasons

  1. Under paragraph 25 of the Housing Ombudsman scheme, the following people can make a complaint to the Ombudsman:
    1. 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. If the complaint is made by an ex-occupier, they must have had a legal relationship with the member at the time that the matter complained of arose;
    2. an applicant for a property owned or managed by a member;
    3. a representative of any of the people above who is authorised by them to make a complaint on their behalf;
    4. a representative of any of the people above who does not have the capacity to authorise a representative to act on their behalf. The Ombudsman must be satisfied that the representative has the legitimate authority to act on the person’s behalf;
    5. a person with authority to make a complaint on behalf of any of the people above who is deceased.
  2. The resident does not fall under the categories of people able to make a complaint to us, because he is a freeholder. For this reason, the Ombudsman is unable to consider this complaint.
  3. While the Ombudsman is not able to consider this complaint, we note that the landlord has already advised the resident that he is able to pursue his challenge of the service charge through the first tier tribunal (property chamber). The tribunal may be able to make a decision as to whether estate charges are reasonable or appropriate.