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

Midland Heart Limited (202303515)

Back to Top

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202303515

Midland Heart Limited

2 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 handling of:
    1. Works to install a replacement kitchen.
    2. The associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant of a housing association. The property is a 2 bedroom house. The resident has health issues including arthritis, which the landlord is aware of.
  2. Works to install a replacement kitchen at the resident’s property began on 21 March 2023. The landlord advised that the works should take 2 weeks. On 4 April 2023, the resident contacted the landlord to raise concerns with the proposed layout of the kitchen. The landlord visited that day and agreed to change the plans to include space for a dishwasher, advising that this would lead to a delay in the works’ completion. With the exception of the dishwasher, the kitchen works were completed on 20 April 2023.
  3. On 11 April 2023, the resident contacted the landlord to make a complaint regarding:
    1. Lack of communication from the kitchen contractor.
    2. The condition of the kitchen during the works leaving her unable to prepare meals.
  4. After the initial replacement kitchen works were completed on 23 May 2023, the stage 1 response was issued on 17 July 2023, following intervention from the service. It explained the kitchen works were initially completed after just over a month after the resident had signed off on the plans and then asked for these to be changed to include space for her dishwasher. The resident was described as asking for the works to be paused to address her concerns and as being left with a working cooker and finished tiling. The landlord said it agreed her requested changes but had told her it could not give her a timescale for them until it heard from its supplier. It also described having access issues, fitting her new dishwasher as a goodwill gesture and partially upheld her complaint for poor complaint handling and the time taken to investigate her concerns, offering her £35 compensation.
  5. The resident then requested her complaint be escalated to stage 2 on 25 July 2023, stating she was unhappy with the stage 1 response, as it did not address key points raised in her complaint, and it included issues that she had not raised. She described being injured on the kitchen units, being unable to cook due to a mess and hygiene concerns in the kitchen so she had to eat takeaways, previously requesting changes to the kitchen design, receiving a late stage 1 response, experiencing missed plumber’s appointments, and not receiving access requests or a completion date.
  6. The stage 2 response was issued on 22 August 2023. It advised that the landlord was unable to assess any effect on health raised by resident but provided details to enable the resident to claim on the landlord’s liability insurance. The response acknowledged key issues raised by the resident, providing an apology for the inclusion of unrelated issues, delays, poor communication, and the effect on her and family, including dust and mess affecting meal preparation. Compensation of £270 in total was offered: £100 for complaint handling, and £170 for delays, inconvenience, and missed appointments.
  7. The resident then complained to the service, advising that she accepted the compensation, however she was unhappy with how the complaint was handled. On 18 August 2024, the landlord offered the resident an additional £285 compensation in recognition of her distress and inconvenience, advising this amount was in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance. The resident accepted this offer on 9 September 2024, confirming that all works were completed. The resident states that this additional payment has not, however, been received.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of the kitchen replacement

  1. The landlord had previously scheduled the kitchen replacement to start in February 2023. However, this date was unsuitable, as the resident advised she would just be out of hospital at that time. Due to a cancellation, however, the landlord was able to schedule the works to begin on 21 March 2023.
  2. A refurbishment consent form was signed by the resident on 6 March 2023 before works started. This form set out what to expect while works were ongoing. It referred to daily contact from the contractor to keep the resident informed, and that work would be done in a tidy manner.
  3. The resident’s request for a change to the kitchen plans to fit a dishwasher was described by the landlord as the main cause of the delay to the works. It explained this was because an order for additional items from the kitchen supplier was required. While this request was recorded by the landlord as requested and agreed with the resident, on 4 April 2023 the resident stated she raised this request at an earlier stage. There is no evidence, however, to confirms this was made earlier. The evidence shows:  
    1. The complaint responses state that the kitchen plans were “signed off” by the resident on 19 December 2022 and that there was no evidence of the request before 4 April 2023. The resident confirms that she did not request the change when the plans were agreed in December 2022 but did so “around that time” to the landlord’s surveyor, saying she was assured the changes would be made. The resident states she also raised the request to the landlord’s customer liaison officer before works started. An internal email dated 4 April 2023 between the landlord and the contractor said the resident raised a request “at pre stage” for a slimline dishwasher, however there is no date provided to confirm when the request was made. This is also in the stage 1 response. It is therefore suggested by the evidence that the resident made the request before  4 April 2023 and that action to change the plans as requested could have been taken earlier.
    2. The evidence shows the delay was also partly due to a change in kitchen supplier, as it is noted that a follow up email from the landlord was needed on 14 April 2023 to get a response from the new supplier with regard to the changed order. There is no evidence to show that this was communicated to the resident. No access issues are also referred to in a number of internal landlord emails when discussing reasons for the delay to the works. Communication between the contractor and the resident show that the resident was informed about scheduled visits, and the resident equally provided feedback as to her availability. The resident informed the contractor in advance regarding scheduled medical appointments at home and the need for privacy at these times. There is therefore no evidence to suggest that access issues contributed to the delay.
    3. The initial kitchen replacement works were completed on 23 May 2023, which was 63 calendar days after these began on 21 March 2023. The resident reported that the landlord told her the works would take 2 weeks or 14 calendar days and the stage 2 response acknowledged that these were delayed and that it did not adequately communicate with her about this. The resident also only confirmed to the landlord that further works to her kitchen were completed on 9 September 2024, which it had agreed were due and was almost 18 months after the works first began. The landlord’s service standards on its website state it will complete major repairs including kitchen replacements within 90 calendar days.
  4. The resident reported that mess during the ongoing works affected her ability to prepare meals, forcing her to rely on takeaways. Photographs of the kitchen dated 14 April 2023 provided by the landlord show a clean worksurface that day, however evidence of condition to kitchen before this date is not available. The stage 1 response did not address issues affecting meal preparation and referred only to the cooker being connected throughout. The stage 2 response, while acknowledging the effect of mess affecting meals, did not include compensation for out of pocket expenses for meals. despite this being included in the landlord’s compensation matrix and complaint policy.
  5. The stage 1 response focused on issues communicated by the contractor in an email to the landlord following the visit on 4 April 2023, in which the contractor noted what they understood to be the resident’s unhappiness with the works to date. This may explain the inclusion of issues in the stage 1 response that the resident stated were not part of her formal complaint made on 11 April 2023. However, the specific issues raised in the resident’s complaint on 11 April 2023 were not addressed. This caused an unnecessary delay in resolving the complaint, as the resident felt ‘unheard’ and requested escalation to stage 2. It is recognised that the stage 2 response addressed all the elements of the resident’s complaint, appropriately offered an apology, and increased compensation in recognition of delay, inconvenience, and missed appointments.
  6. In terms of the compensation offered in the stage 2 response, the landlord offered £170 for inconvenience. A breakdown of how the £170 was calculated was not provided. The landlord’s compensation matrix allows for compensation in a range of circumstances, including:
    1. Loss of essential services, no cooking facilities, inconvenience and disruption over and above service standards, and failed appointments.
    2. Goodwill payments for upset and inconvenience.
    3. Delays to installations over and above service standards.
    4. Out of pocket expenses.
  7. In addition, the landlord’s complaints policy offers compensation in the following circumstances:
    1. Loss or suffering to warrant such a payment.
    2. Suffering significant inconvenience as a result of the landlord’s or contractors’ actions.
    3. Where appropriate, fair in accordance with the landlord’s compensation matrix and the Ombudsman’ remedies guidance.
  8. The resident accepted the stage 2 compensation offer and received payment. She escalated the complaint to the service, however, as she stated that complaint responses did not fully address all the issues. On 15 August 2024, the landlord increased the compensation offer by £285 advising “this was in line with our remedies guidance for failures that adversely affect the resident”. The landlord also sent flowers, which the resident appreciated. However, the increased offer was also only made almost a year after the stage 2 response on 22 August 2023, and only after she complained to the Ombudsman, which was very inappropriate.
  9. The resident stated that she did however not receive the additional £285 compensation payment. Further communication with both the resident and the landlord revealed that the resident had made an error when supplying her bank account details to the landlord. The landlord had issued the payment as agreed using the details provided by the resident. The payment had been returned to the landlord by the bank however due to the incorrect account information. It is therefore acknowledged that the landlord did indeed make the payment. Nevertheless the landlord is ordered to re issue this payment to ensure the compensation is successfully received by the resident.
  10. The landlord was responsible for maladministration in relation to the length of time it took to complete the resident’s kitchen replacement works, its poor communication and lack of updates about these. It is therefore appropriate that the landlord apologise to the resident for the further failures identified by this investigation, which it has been ordered to do below, that frustrated the resolution of the matter. The landlord has been further ordered to carry out a case review of its handling of the resident’s case to identify exactly why its failures in this case happened and to outline exactly how it proposes to prevent them from happening again.
  11. The landlord has also been ordered to pay the resident the £285 further compensation it previously offered her. Its compensation matrix and complaints policy allow for ‘out of pocket expenses’ and costs for meals. It is therefore appropriate that, given the resident reported such costs from mess in her kitchen preventing her food preparation and the landlord’s stage 2 response acknowledged but did not consider compensating for this, her reported expenses for meal costs should be recognised by it. Therefore, the landlord has been ordered to pay the resident another £230 compensation for this and its further delays, poor communication, and late increased compensation offer and payment. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance’s recommendation of awards in this range for failures by the landlord that adversely affected the resident.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaints

  1. The landlord has a 2–stage complaints procedure in its complaints, comments, compliments and reasonable adjustments policy, which is in line with the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code (the Code) and states it will:
    1. acknowledge complaints within 5 working days of receipt.
    2. aim to provide response to stage 1 complaints within 10 working days and will agree any extension to this timescale with the resident.
    3. aim to respond to stage 2 complaints within 20 working days and will agree any extension to this timescale with the resident.
  2. In its handling of the stage 1 complaint, the landlord failed to comply with its own procedure, as it failed to provide an acknowledgement to the resident within 5 working days of her complaint of 11 April 2023. It was only following intervention from the service on 27 June 2023 that the landlord acknowledged the complaint 60 working days after this was made on 6 July 2023, advising that a response would be issued by 12 July 2023. The resident was then notified of a further extension on that date and the response was issued on 17 July 2023. This was an unacceptable delay of 67 working days after the complaint was first made and was a failing with regard to complaint handling at this stage. The Code requires landlords to have a timescale of 10 working days for stage 1 extension requests, with further extensions to be agreed in exceptional circumstances.
  3. Concerningly, the stage 1 response did not give reasons for the lack of a timely complaint acknowledgement or the excessive delay in responding to the complaint. The landlord did offer the resident £35 compensation in recognition of “poor complaint handling and time taken to investigate” the stage 1 response.
  4. It is acknowledged that the stage 2 response to the resident’s 25 July 2023 escalation request, issued within the landlord’s policy’s 20-working-day timescale on 22 August 2023, sought to respond to all of the resident’s complaint issues. It offered a genuine apology and £100 compensation for her inconvenience and the effect of he works on the resident and her family. It demonstrated a commitment to learning by detailing the actions it would take to address its complaint handling failures and contractor’s conduct by giving feedback to its complaint handling staff and asking its contract manager to work with its contractor to improve its service delivery. This response did not, however, provide reasons for the significant delay in the stage 1 complaint response and this should have been provided to demonstrate a commitment to open and effective complaint handling. The lack of information regarding the stage 1 response delay was a particular source of frustration for the resident.
  5. The resident then escalated the case to the service for investigation. As noted above, the additional compensation of £285 offered by the landlord was accepted by the resident, however this has not been received. The resident contacted the landlord on several occasions to chase payment. An important aspect of complaint handling is ensuring agreed redress and actions are completed in timely manner, which is a requirement of the Code. It is acknowledged that the landlord had made the payment however it failed to identify that the bank returned the payment and an opportunity to rectify the residents error was missed. 
  6. While poor complaint handling with regard to stage 1 complaint was acknowledged by the landlord in both complaint responses, the lack of timely acknowledgement, delay and failure to provide adequate reasons for the delay was unacceptable. The landlord was therefore responsible for maladministration in relation to its complaint handling and has been ordered to pay the resident another £250 compensation in recognition of this. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance’s recommended range of compensation for such failures that have adversely affected the resident. The landlord has also been recommended to provide refresher training to its complaints staff to make sure their processes and actions follow its policy and the Code.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52. of the Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in its handling of works to install a replacement kitchen.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52. of the Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendation

Orders

  1. The landlord is ordered to, within 4 weeks of the date of this report:
    1. Issue a written apology to the resident for the further delays and poor communication and complaint handling identified by this investigation.
    2. Pay the resident £765 total compensation, made up of:
      1. £285 increased compensation it previously offered to the resident.
      2. £230 additional compensation for the resident’s reported cost of meals, further delays, poor communication.
      3. £250 additional compensation in recognition of the failings identified in this investigation in its complaint handling.
    3. Carry out a case review of its handling of the resident’s case to identify exactly why its failures in this case happened and to outline exactly how it proposes to prevent them from happening.

Recommendation

  1. It is recommended that the landlord provide refresher training to its complaints staff to make sure their processes and actions follow its policy and the Code.