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London Borough of Brent (202328862)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202328862

London Borough of Brent

29 April 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. This complaint is about the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of repairs to the roof and guttering, communal wall area and a side gate.

Background

  1. The resident is a leaseholder of the landlord, which is a local authority. The property is a 1-bedroom first floor flat. The building contains 2 flats.
  2. Prior to logging this complaint with the landlord, the resident had made a previous complaint regarding the guttering at her property. The landlord issued its final response to that complaint on 20 January 2023. In its final response, the landlord said that a job had been raised to inspect and repair the guttering. The landlord also said that its housing management team would write to the resident within a week to confirm when these works would begin and to advise of the proposed costs. The landlord also said that it would remind its home ownership team, and its contractor, of the importance of responding to queries in a timely manner.
  3. On 25 June 2023, the resident raised a formal complaint with the landlord:
    1. With regards to the roof and guttering, following the landlord’s stage 2 response to her previous complaint, dated 20 January 2023, she had had to chase it for the works it promised would be done. She had provided an email trail from 7 March to 18 June 2023 which showed a missed appointment on 21 February 2023 and her explanation for declining a site meeting with the landlord’s surveyor. The resident said that a roofer attended on 27 March 2023 and removed the blockages from the guttering. The resident also said that her questions about what preventative measures could be taken were being ‘continuously’ ignored.
    2. With regards to the hole in the communal area wall, which she had reported on 1 May 2023. A repair appointment was scheduled for 9 June 2023. She had then been asked to cancel this by the downstairs neighbour but was told that the contractor was not going to attend that day and had rearranged it for 23 May 2023. The resident said that the contractor did not attend on 23 May 2023 nor did they tell her that they would not be attending the appointment on 9 June 2023.
    3. With regards to the side gate. This was reported on 1 March 2023 and a repair appointment scheduled for 9 March 2023, but the contractor did not attend. The resident said she was not told why they did not attend but was told the appointment had been re-booked for 24 March 2023. The resident said that she had asked a manager to contact her to explain this but the responsibility was put on her to contact the contractor directly.
  4. In its complaint responses the landlord acknowledged the resident’s frustration with the delays to repairs as well as the cancellation of appointments by its contractor without prior warning. The landlord also:
    1. Acknowledged that following its response to the resident’s previous complaint she had had to chase for matters to be progressed.
    2. Apologised for the level of service the resident had received and the inconvenience caused in having to chase up the various matters.
    3. Said that as a resolution to the complaint, and in light of the concerns raised by the resident, it had asked that its Housing Management Service:
      1. Identify a named officer who should get in touch with the resident within a fortnight and provide information and outline realistic timeframes for the outstanding actions (i.e. roof/guttering, side-gate, and hole in the wall).
      2. Assess and provide a written assessment of the state of the roof with the view to having a discussion regarding replacing the roof and whether this is a cost-effective solution. They had also been asked to provide confirmation as to why the appointments on 27 March and 5 June 2023 were both necessary.
      3. Once it has been confirmed that no additional wiring work was required through the hole in the communal wall, Housing Management would be asked to ensure the filler work was assessed and, if deemed substandard, redone and the wall to be re-painted.
      4. To liaise with relevant officers and ensure the resident was not billed as part of the service charge for the repair to the side gate.
    4. Said that it would ask that an appropriate manager from its contractor provides the resident with written correspondence within a fortnight to address her concerns about the overall poor standard of service, both in relation to cancelled appointments and standard of repairs. They will also be asked to:
      1. Explain what action is being taken to address what the resident considered to be ongoing service failures.
      2. Review their procedure in relation to providing residents with notifications when communal works are going to be carried out.
      3. Review how rescheduled appointments are communicated with residents.
    5. Offered the resident a total of £350 compensation for distress and inconvenience caused by the delays to repairs (including those outlined in its previous stage two response of 20 January 2023), and overall poor communication. The landlord said that the £350 included half the costs of the private repairs to the gutters as well as a reasonable contribution towards the compensation sought to cover the costs of decorating the bathroom wall affected by the water leakage.

Assessment and findings

  1. The Ombudsman’s role is to assess whether the landlord has followed proper procedure, good practice, and behaved reasonably, taking account of all the circumstances of the case. When considering the landlord’s handling of the matter, the Ombudsman is guided by the landlord’s policies and procedures and our own Dispute Resolution Principles, which are:
    1. To be fair – treat people fairly and follow fair process.
    2. To put things right.
    3. Learn from outcomes.
  2. When considering how a landlord has responded to a complaint, the Ombudsman considers not just what has gone wrong, but also what the landlord has done to put things right in response to a complaint. This includes the steps the landlord has taken to address the shortcoming and prevent a reoccurrence, as well as any compensation offered.
  3. In this case, the landlord was fair in its response to the concerns raised by the resident. It did not dispute that there were failings in its handling of this matter and offered a reasonable level of compensation for those failings.
  4. This has not been disputed by the resident who has advised us that she would have been satisfied with the outcome of her complaint ‘if only’ the landlord had done what it had said it would do in its final response. The side gate repair having been completed by the time of the resident’s escalation request of 1 July 2023.
  5. The resident also said that despite acknowledging its failure to follow through with the commitments it had made in its previous final response, it then proceeded to again fail to deliver on the commitments it made in her new complaint.
  6. In this case the landlord had committed to:
    1. Identifying a named officer who should get in touch with the resident within a fortnight and provide information and outline realistic timeframes for the outstanding actions (i.e. roof/guttering, side-gate, and hole in the wall).
    2. Assessing and provide a written assessment of the state of the roof with the view to having a discussion regarding replacing the roof and whether this is a cost-effective solution.
    3. Provide confirmation as to why the appointments on 27 March and 5 June 2023 were both necessary.
    4. Asking that an appropriate manager from its contractor provides the resident with written correspondence within a fortnight to address her concerns about the overall poor standard of service, both in relation to cancelled appointments and standard of repairs.
    5. Ensuring that once it had been confirmed that no additional wiring work was required through the hole in the communal wall, it would ensure the filler work was assessed and, if deemed substandard, redone and the wall to be re-painted.
    6. Ensuring the resident would not be charged for the repair to the side gate.
  7. However, by 4 November 2023, almost 4 months after its final response, the only commitment that the landlord had fulfilled was an email to the resident on 23 August 2023 explaining why its contractors attended on both 27 March and 5 June 2023. The resident advised this service that, at this point:
    1. She had still not heard from her ‘point of contact’ since their ‘brief voicemail message.’
    2. She had had no contact regarding the assessment of the roof.
    3. She had also had no contact from the landlord’s contractors regarding their poor service standards.
    4. She had been charged for the side gate.
  8. This was despite the resident contacting the landlord on:
    1. 30 September 2023 to say that the only contact she had had from her ‘point of contact’ was a brief voicemail message, and she had not heard from them again.
    2. 16 October 2023 to say that the landlord had still not carried out the actions it had agreed to in its final response and that nobody was updating her.
    3. On 19 October 2023 to say that its contractor had still not contacted her.
  9. The landlord’s leasehold management team also raised concerns in an internal email of 28 December 2023 that it ‘appear(ed) that none of the recommendations in the stage 2 response had been undertaken’. They also noted that they had charged the resident for the side gate, as they had not been informed not to. The leasehold management team said they had raised a credit on the resident’s service charge account and would be issuing the resident with a credit for this.
  10. In an email to the Ombudsman on 1 February 2024, 6 months after the landlord’s final response, the resident advised that hole in the communal wall had been ‘clearly re-plastered to a better standard than before’. However, no redecoration had taken place. 
  11. The resident then confirmed in a call with us on 24 April 2025:
    1. That the communal wall had by that point not been redecorated.
    2. She received no further contact from her point of contact, beyond the voicemail message originally left for her.
    3. On 12 September 2024, she raised a new complaint with the landlord about ongoing issues, which included the roof, for which the landlord issued a stage 1 response on 20 September 2024.
    4. That she never received any contact from the landlord’s contractors regarding their poor service standards.
  12. In accordance with our Complaint Handling Code (the Code), when remedy is offered by the landlord, this must be followed through to completion. It is evident in this case that the landlord failed to do so.
  13. Further, the Code states that landlord’s must look beyond the circumstances of the individual complaint and consider whether service improvements can be made as a result of any learning from the complaint.
  14. In this case, the resident’s complaint was not only about her current situation but also about the landlord not following through with its commitments from her previous complaint. This earlier failure was acknowledged by the landlord in its response to the complaint considered here. However, despite being provided this clear opportunity to learn from the residents complaint and ensure that service improvements were made going forward, it failed to do so. Instead, the landlord again failed to deliver on the commitments made.
  15. The combination of these failures has resulted in a finding of maladministration. To put right the understandable frustration, and time and trouble to the resident as a result of its failures, the landlord has been ordered to apologise and pay her an additional £200 compensation.
  16. Having discussed the complaint with the resident it is clear that the most important outcome for her is for the landlord to evidence that it had learned from her complaints in order to ensure that similar failures do not occur again going forward.
  17. As a result, and given that continuous improvement and learning from complaints is a key element of the Code, the landlord has been ordered to its review its handling of the commitments made in both this complaint and the resident’s earlier complaint, for which it issued its final response on 20 January 2023. This review is to consider:
    1. Where the shortfalls were in its service that lead to it repeatedly failing to effectively manager and deliver the commitments it made in its complaint responses.
    2. What steps it needs to take to ensure that it has a robust process in place so that going forward any commitments made in its complaint responses are followed through to completion, and in a timely manner.
  18. The landlord is to provide both the resident and the Ombudsman with the outcome of the above review.
  19. The landlord’s response to the resident’s new complaint, for which it issued its stage 1 response on 20 September 2024, has not been considered as part of this investigation. However, it has been recommended that the landlord ensures that any learning from the review ordered in this case be applied to the resident’s more recent complaint. Most especially that any commitments made in its response(s) to that complaint are effectively managed and delivered within a reasonable timeframe.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in respect of its response to the resident’s reports of repairs to the roof and guttering, communal wall area and a side gate.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. That within 4 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord is ordered to:
    1. Apologise to the resident for the failures identified in this report.
    2. Pay the resident a total of £550 compensation. This is inclusive of the £350 previously offered if this has not already been paid.
    3. Review its handling of the commitments made in both this complaint and the resident’s earlier complaint, for which it issued its final response on 20 January 2023. This review is to consider:
      1. Where the shortfalls were in its service that lead to it repeatedly failing to effectively manager and deliver the commitments it made in its complaint responses.
      2. What steps it needs to take to ensure that it has a robust process in place so that going forward any commitments made in its complaint responses are followed through to completion, and in a timely manner.
    4. Provide both the resident and the Ombudsman with the outcome of the above review within the timescale set out above.
    5. Confirm compliance with the above orders.

Recommendation

  1. It is recommended that the landlord ensures that any learning from the review ordered in this case be applied to the resident’s more recent complaint. Most especially that any commitments made in its response(s) be effectively managed and delivered within a reasonable timeframe.