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London & Quadrant Housing Trust (202424148)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202424148

London & Quadrant Housing Trust (L&Q)

25 July 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 handling of the resident’s complaint about the condition of her property, its proposed works, and her wish to move home.

Background

  1. The resident has held an assured tenancy since 2011. The property is a 2 bedroom ground floor flat where she lives with her four children.
  2. In November 2023 the resident’s solicitor sent the landlord a pre-action protocol for housing conditions claim. An expert surveyor, instructed by the solicitor, inspected the resident’s property in January 2024. The resultant report identified damp, mould, and disrepair.
  3. The landlord only appeared to become aware of the claim in mid-2024, which is when the evidence shows it first acted in response. It referred the matter to its legal team. It instructed a further expert inspection, which was completed in August 2024 and identified the need for 3 days of works.
  4. The following month the landlord attended appointments at the resident’s property. This included an asbestos survey ahead of the works. The resident chased it for updates from August to October 2024. She asked where she would live during the works and to be permanently moved to a larger property. On 16 October 2024 she complained about its poor communications, and what she considered to be the insufficient works recommended in its expert report.
  5. The landlord’s stage 1 response, two days later, said that the resident should contact her solicitor if she was unhappy with its expert report. It also explained her moving and rehousing options. The landlord’s internal communications said that it had been unable to agree access with her for the works.
  6. Over the following months the resident continued to express her concerns about the scope of the proposed works, and the impact of them on her child’s ADHD. She asked for a new expert report to be completed and to be permanently moved to a bigger property. She confirmed that she had ended her instruction to her solicitor.
  7. During February 2025, the landlord scheduled 3 days of works to begin on 11 March 2025. The resident continued to express her concerns and escalated her complaint. The landlord’s stage 2 response, on 7 March 2025, said that its legal disrepair team was still managing the resident’s ongoing case. It referred her to the rehousing options it had provided at stage 1.
  8. During the remainder of the month the resident asked for the works to be put on hold and made a new complaint. The landlord asked her for information that it said it would put to its “decant panel”. It subsequently told her that it could arrange temporary accommodation at a hotel for the duration of the works. The resident said this was unsuitable for her family’s needs.
  9. The resident asked the Ombudsman to investigate the matters above. She said that she wanted to be urgently rehoused. She continued to dispute the extent of the intended works but said that she was willing to temporarily move to a suitable property to allow more substantial works to take place.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident’s new complaint to the landlord in March 2025 included her unhappiness with its actions between April and June 2025, including its:
    1. Temporary accommodation offer.
    2. Handling of the outcome of a joint inspection with the local council’s environmental health team.
    3. Handling and rejection of her direct medical transfer application.
    4. Solicitor’s communications regarding an injunction to secure property access for her works.
  2. The landlord sent its final response to the resident’s new complaint on 19 June 2025. While several of the issues involve further developments in matters from her original complaint, others are new. Because of that, and the fact we have no evidence at this stage for the new complaint, it will not be considered in this report.
  3. Accordingly, this investigation centres on the resident’s complaint to the landlord in October 2024, to which it responded in October 2024 and March 2025. Events following March 2025 would be part of a new investigation, which the resident has been separately contacted about.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s complaint

  1. It is not apparent from the evidence why the landlord was unaware of the resident’s housing condition claim, made in November 2023, until it referred it to its legal team in mid-2024. The first evidence seen of the landlord mentioning her solicitor’s expert survey report was in September 2024. This was at the same time it received the expert report from the inspection arranged by its own legal team, and completed the previous month.
  2. Aside from the arrangement of that inspection, the first evidence seen of the resident reporting the condition of her property was during August 2024, when she contacted the landlord several times. During September 2024, the landlord attended an asbestos survey and a pest control appointment, which had been identified at its expert’s inspection. Both were completed within the 20 working day timeframe in its repairs policy.
  3. However, the landlord’s poor communications to the resident during this period failed to respond to her concerns about the property and her wish to move home. This led to her complaint on 16 October 2024. She highlighted the landlord’s lack of information regarding the works and her belief that it was “trying to cut corners”. She asked that it consider her solicitor’s expert report. She expressed concerns about the works being undertaken with her family in residence. She stated that the damp and mould was worsened by how overcrowded they were, and that she needed to be permanently moved.
  4. The Ombudsman’s guidance to landlords emphasises the importance of them continuing to “use the complaints procedure when the pre-action protocol has commenced”. It highlights the need that its “legal and complaint teams work together effectively where an issue is being pursued through the complaints process and protocol”.
  5. The landlord could have used the resident’s complaint to address her concerns, provide assurance, and manage her expectations. It was a failing that it did not do so at either stage of its process. It instead only referred her to her solicitor, or to the fact that its legal disrepair team was managing her case. Its stage 1 response, on 18 October 2024, provided general housing options advice but failed to address her specific concerns about the impact of the repairs.
  6. The evidence also shows that, contrary to the Ombudsman’s guidance, the landlord’s legal and complaint teams failed to work together effectively. The same day that the landlord sent the resident its stage 1 response, its legal team highlighted her concerns to its complaints team. It said that it had been unable to agree access with the resident for the works. It asked the complaints team to address this and chased it several times during November and December 2024.
  7. However, there is no evidence that the landlord contacted the resident about her repairs until January 2025, when her MP and its executive support team became involved. The resident also chased the matter through this period and expressed her distress and the impact on her children.
  8. On 7 January 2025 the landlord told the resident that it did not rehouse tenants due to overcrowding, but could consider a move in exceptional circumstances such as medical reasons. This is the only evidence seen of the landlord directly responding to the resident’s overcrowding concerns, despite her raising them in and throughout her complaint.
  9. The landlord’s internal communications, prior to the resident’s complaint, expressed its concerns with the quality of her solicitor’s expert report. The landlord was entitled to act in line with the work stated in its own more recent expert report. Nonetheless, it was aware that the resident strongly disputed the scope of its works. Her complaint was an opportunity for it to assure her, and explain its rationale for relying on its own report, which it failed to take.
  10. The resident and landlord’s expert reports both stated that the recommended works could be completed with her and her family in residence. Nonetheless, it would have been reasonable for the landlord to respond to her specific concerns about this, which she had raised since August 2024. There is no evidence that it did so, nor considered her child’s vulnerability, until after the conclusion of her complaint in March 2025.
  11. Overall, from mid-2024, the landlord’s arrangement of an expert disrepair inspection and follow up appointments was timely. It was entitled to base its proposed works on its expert’s findings, which it tried to book in with the resident in mid-October 2024. Its limited communications failed to address the resident’s concerns, nor demonstrate that it had considered the household’s vulnerabilities. Her complaint presented a clear opportunity to remedy this, which it failed to take. It did not acknowledge any of these failings in its stage 1 or 2 responses. The resident’s complaint was therefore left unresolved. Her ongoing concerns are the subject of a new complaint and a potential new Ombudsman investigation.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s complaint.

Orders

  1. Within 4 weeks the landlord must pay the resident £350 compensation in relation to the time, trouble, and distress caused by the failures identified in this report.
  2. Within 6 weeks the landlord must review how it handles formal complaints that are the subject of a housing conditions claim, identify areas for improvement, and write to the Service with its findings.
  3. The landlord must provide us with evidence of its compliance with these orders within their respective timescales.