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London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham (202327447)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202327447

Hammersmith and Fulham Council

17 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. The complaint is about the landlord’s:
    1. Offer of compensation for its handling of a repair to a hole in paving by the entrance door.
    2. Complaint handling.

Background

  1. The resident is a leaseholder of the property, which is a 1st floor 1 bed flat.
  2. Works were carried out by a utility company in March 2021 and pipes were installed underneath the entrance path to the property. The utility company did not reinstate the pathway tiles. As such, the landlord carried out work to make the path safe later that same month.
  3. The landlord received reports between June 2021 and June 2023 that the work to the path had been disturbed, including by reported vandalism. Following each report it carried out work to make the pathway safe.
  4. The resident submitted a complaint on 25 July 2023. He said that there had been a hole in the path outside the property for 2 years despite him having told the landlord on many occasions.
  5. In August 2023 the landlord enquired internally about a permanent fix. It noted that the suggested work was to renew the path tiles. As such, a Section 20 consultation process would be needed. It raised another temporary repair in the meantime.
  6. The landlord responded at stage 1 on 11 September 2023 and said as follows:
    1. It apologised for the delay in responding.
    2. It confirmed the temporary repairs it had carried out to make the path safe. It apologised for the distress and inconvenience of the path having been disturbed after the works. It had arranged another temporary repair and would arrange a permanent solution.
    3. It offered £225 compensation, made up as follows:
      1. £100 for the delay in providing a permanent fix to the path.
      2. £75 for the distress and inconvenience caused.
      3. £50 for the delay in responding to the complaint.
  7. On 11 September 2023 the resident said that the landlord had misrepresented his complaint. He asked for the temporary fix not to be carried out as the mixture would wash away and make the area slippery. He also said that the landlord had promised a permanent fix since 2021. He escalated his complaint on this basis on 20 September 2023.
  8. Contractors attended to carry out a temporary fix on 16 September 2023. They noted that they had been unable to carry out the work due to the resident’s behaviour and him declining the work.
  9. The landlord responded at stage 2 on 9 October 2023 and said as follows:
    1. It reiterated the repairs it had carried out. It acknowledged that it had failed to address the repair in a timely manner. It outlined the lessons learnt in respect of communication and customer service.
    2. Contractors had attended to carry out work on 16 September 2023 but they had to leave without doing the work. They would reattend.
    3. It offered a total of £375 compensation, made up as follows:
      1. £225 previously offered at stage 1.
      2. £150 for the delay in providing a permanent fix to the path.
  10. The resident referred his complaint to us on 16 October 2023. He said that a permanent fix had not been completed after 2 years. This was a hazard. The compensation was not enough given the time he had spent reporting the issue. He said that the landlord should offer him the maximum amount of compensation stated in its compensation policy, namely over £1,000.
  11. Following the completion of the internal complaints procedure, the landlord told us that works to the path had been completed on 4 June 2024.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s offer of compensation for its handling of a repair to a hole in paving by the entrance door

  1. It is not in dispute that the maintenance of the path leading to the communal entrance door is the landlord’s responsibility. The landlord’s repairs policy sets out its timeframe for repairs as follows:
    1. Emergency – within 24 hours.
    2. Routine – within 20 working days.
    3. Planned – within 60 working days.
  2. Where there is an emergency repair issue it will attend to make the issue safe. It may then take longer to carry out a permanent repair.
  3. In this case, the landlord was made aware of the issue with the pathway in March 2021. Although it was reasonable for it to carry out a repair to make this safe, it did not follow this up with a permanent repair. As such, the temporary repairs failed on a number of occasions between 2021 and 2023. The resident reported this a number of times and also raised concerns that this was a hazard. Despite this, the landlord had not carried out a permanent repair by the completion of the internal complaints procedure on 9 October 2023. This was around 2 and a half years later.
  4. When a resident reports a risk, the landlord should inspect to check for hazards in a timely manner. Hazards are set out in the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS). The HHSRS is a risk-based evaluation tool to help local authorities identify and protect against potential risks and hazards from deficiencies in properties. It was introduced under the Housing Act 2004 and applies to residential properties in England and Wales.
  5. An uneven entrance pathway is a potential hazard that can fall within the scope of the HHSRS. Despite being aware of the ongoing nature of the potential hazard, the landlord failed to carry out a permanent repair to minimise the risk to the resident and other users of the building. As such, it did not show that it had done all it could do to reduce this possible hazard. 
  6. Although the landlord apologised for its failure to complete a permanent repair, it did not explain why it had not done so. We have seen that the landlord considered whether it needed to replace the entire pathway. As such, a consultation with leaseholders would be required via a Section 20 notice. Although this consideration was reasonable, there is no evidence that the landlord had told the resident that it was considering this as an option, or that this had impacted on it carrying out a permanent repair. As such, the landlord lacked transparency as to the options it was considering.
  7. The landlord offered a total of £325 compensation for the effect on the resident of its handling of the path repair. Its offer of compensation for complaint handling has been considered separately below. This offer of compensation was towards the lower end of its medium range, as outlined in its compensation policy. The policy says it will award such an amount where there has been a failure over a considerable period of time to address a repair.
  8. When a failure is identified, as in this case, our role is to consider whether the redress offered by the landlord put things right and resolved the resident’s complaint satisfactorily. In considering this, we take into account whether the  offer of redress was in line with our Dispute Resolution Principles: Be Fair, Put Things Right and Learn from Outcomes as well as our guidance on remedies.
  9. The offer of compensation was within the range we would expect to be offered where there were failures which adversely affected a resident. However, given the significant period of time the issue had been ongoing without a permanent fix, along with the potential hazard, the compensation was not sufficient. Despite being aware of the issue since 2021 the landlord did not act in a timely manner to carry out a permanent repair to reduce the potential hazard. As such there was maladministration.
  10. To acknowledge the effect of the failures on the resident, we have ordered an additional £175 compensation. This brings the total compensation for this issue to £500. This is in line with our remedies guidance where a landlord has acknowledged failings and made some attempt to put things right but failed to address the detriment to the resident and the offer was not proportionate.

Complaint handling

  1. The landlord has a 2 stage complaints procedure. At stage 1 it will acknowledge a complaint within 5 working days. It aims to respond within 10 working days of the acknowledgement. At stage 2 it aims to respond within 20 working days. If additional time is needed at ether stage, it will keep the resident informed. These timeframes mirror our Complaint Handling Code (the Code).
  2. The resident submitted a complaint on 25 July 2023. The landlord acknowledged this the following day. On 8 August 2023 it advised the resident that it needed more time to respond and that it aimed to do so by 22 August 2023.
  3. The landlord sent the stage 1 response on 11 September 2023. This was 33 working days after the acknowledgement. This was outside of its response timeframe. The landlord addressed the main issue and acknowledged that its complaint response had been delayed. It offered £50 compensation for this.
  4. The resident escalated the complaint on 20 September 2023. The landlord responded at stage 2 on 9 October 2023. This was 13 working days after the escalation request, so within the timeframe of its complaints procedure.
  5. The landlord did go some way to inform the resident that its stage 1 response would be delayed. However, it did not provide the response within the extended timeframe it had advised the resident of. There is no evidence that it had further communicated with the resident to advise that the response would be further delayed.
  6. It was appropriate for the landlord to offer compensation to acknowledge the delay. However the compensation offered was not sufficient considering the lack of further updates to the resident and the stage 1 response having taken around 3 times the timeframe in the policy. As such, there was service failure. To acknowledge the effect of this on the resident, additional compensation of £50 has been ordered. This brings the total compensation for complaint handling to £100.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s offer of compensation for its handling of a repair to a hole in paving by the entrance door.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was service failure in the landlord’s complaint handling.

Orders

  1. The landlord is ordered to take the following action within 4 weeks of this report and provide evidence of compliance to the Ombudsman:
    1. Pay a total of £600 compensation to the resident. This includes the landlord’s previous offer of £375 compensation. The landlord can deduct this amount if it can provide evidence this has already been paid. The compensation is made up as follows:
      1. £500 to acknowledge the effect on the resident of the landlord’s consideration of compensation for its handling of a repair to a hole in paving by the entrance door.
      2. £100 to acknowledge the effect on the resident of the landlord’s complaint handling failures.