Applications are open to join the next Housing Ombudsman Resident Panel – find out more Housing Ombudsman Resident Panel.

London & Quadrant Housing Trust (L&Q) (202222811)

Back to Top

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202222811

London & Quadrant Housing Trust (L&Q)

20 February 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 request to be removed from the tenancy.

Background and summary of events

2.             The resident was an assured tenant of a ground floor, 3-bedroom flat from 26 August 2020. The resident lived there with her ex-husband and 3 children.

3.             On 17 July 2022 the resident made her own arrangements and left the property with her children. She said this was due to the condition of the property and ongoing repair issues with the landlord. She said that due to the ongoing repair issues she felt the property was unsafe to remain in with her children. She then submitted a joint to sole tenancy change request form (change form) on 25 July 2022.

4.             The resident raised a complaint on 19 January 2023. She said she had submitted the change form on several occasions but the landlord had not removed her from the tenancy. As a result she was still having to pay rent despite not having lived at the property since July 2022.

5.             The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 30 January 2023. It said that the resident’s tenancy change application had been signed off by the area housing manager and passed to the lettings team who would be in contact with her.

6.             The resident escalated her complaint on 30 January 2023. She said that it should not take the landlord 6 months to remove her from the tenancy, especially given she had been housed elsewhere. She said that as a result of this delay she was still being held liable for the rent and arrears on the account.

7.             The landlord’s stage 2 response was issued on 3 March 2023. It said that due to the circumstances of her leaving the property, it had tried to speak to the resident before removing her from the tenancy. It apologised for any inconvenience that had caused and confirmed it had removed her from the tenancy with immediate effect. The landlord also confirmed that the arrears on the account amounted to £28.09.

8.             The resident contacted this Service on 26 March 2023 and confirmed she wanted us to investigate the complaint. She said that she had not yet been removed from the tenancy and wanted us to investigate the matter.

Assessment and findings

9.             The landlord’s ‘Tenant FAQs’ webpage says that it will consider changing a tenancy from joint to sole if both tenants are in full agreement and have submitted a change form.

10.        On 25 July 2022 the resident submitted a completed and signed change form and this was stamped as received by the landlord on the 26 July 2022. The evidence provided shows the resident re-submitted the change form by email on 2 September 2022. This email was stamped as received that same day but also contains a note saying the resident was told she had only submitted part of the form. The resident submitted a further copy of the change form, in full, on 30 September 2022 and it was marked as received the same day.

11.        The change form the resident re-submitted on 2 September 2022 was the same as the one she submitted in July 2022. However, the Ombudsman has not seen any evidence of the landlord contacting the resident following her initial submission, especially in relation to informing her she had not completed the full form. The landlord should have proactively contacted the resident to inform her that she had not completed the entire change form. It was unreasonable for the landlord not to have communicated this to the resident until she re-submitted the change form 2 months later. This subsequently caused an avoidable 2 month delay in any action to remove the resident from the tenancy being taken.

12.        The landlord’s stage 1 response said that the resident’s change form had been signed off and passed to the lettings team, who would be in contact with the resident. However, the landlord did not explain why the resident had not yet been removed from the tenancy despite having re-submitted the change form 4 months earlier. This was unreasonable as there had already been a significant delay in the tenancy being changed.

13.        In its stage 2 response the landlord said that due to the circumstances under which the resident left the property, it had tried to contact her to discuss her housing situation. However, it has not provided evidence of these communication attempts or when they took place. It has also not shown that it tried to contact the resident in a different way after being unable to speak to her. Without this evidence, the Ombudsman cannot reasonably conclude that the landlord made all reasonable attempts to contact the resident in order to discuss her removal from the tenancy. As a result, there was an unnecessary delay in the landlord actioning the resident’s request for the tenancy to be changed.

14.        The Ombudsman has also noted that the stage 2 response says that the resident’s change form had been approved and she had been removed from the tenancy with immediate effect. However, the landlord has not provided any evidence to show that she has been removed. Without this evidence, the Ombudsman cannot reasonably conclude that the landlord has removed the resident from the tenancy.

15.        Overall the landlord’s failures, as set out above, can be summarised as a failure to adequately communicate with the resident and to remove her from the tenancy within a reasonable period of time. Cumulatively these failures amount to a service failure as they led to a significant delay in the resident being removed from the tenancy. This in turn caused the resident avoidable distress and inconvenience as she had to chase the landlord for an update about the tenancy change. Additionally, the resident has said she has continued to be held liable for rent and arrears on the account.

16.        The Ombudsman is aware that the resident has said that after she left the property she continued to be held liable for and pay the rent, even after she was rehoused. It is not the within the Ombudsman’s remit to determine when the correct assignment date should have been or if the resident should have been held liable for the rent during any delays. These are legal matters which are better suited to be dealt with by the courts.

17.        In view of this, the Ombudsman will be ordering the landlord to apologise for the failings identified in this report and pay £300 compensation. This sum is in line with the Ombudsman’s published remedies guidance for failings which have adversely affected the resident and the landlord has failed to acknowledge its failings and/or has made no attempt to put things right.

18.        The Ombudsman will also be ordering the landlord to write to the resident to confirm that she has been removed from the tenancy and backdate this to when she first rescinded her interest in the property.

Determination (decision)

19.        In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was a service failure by the landlord in relation to its handling of the resident’s request to be removed from the tenancy.

Orders

20.        Within 4 weeks the landlord must apologise to the resident for its failures. This written apology must be from a member of the landlord’s senior management team and should follow the Ombudsman’s apologies guidance on our website.

21.        Within 4 weeks of the date of this determination the landlord must:

  1. Directly pay the resident £300 for the time, trouble and inconvenience caused by its poor handling of the resident’s request to be removed from the tenancy.
  2. Write to the resident with evidence that she has been removed from the tenancy agreement and backdate this to July 2022 when she first rescinded her interest in the property.

22.        The landlord is to reply to this Service to provide evidence of compliance with these orders within the timescales set out above.

Recommendations

23.        The landlord should consider changing its auto rent recovery system so that correspondence are paused, where appropriate, while a tenancy change is in process.

24.        The landlord should consider adding more information and clarity on its website about the tenancy change process.