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Moat Homes Limited (202341736)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202341736

Moat Homes Limited

31 March 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. Response to the resident’s concerns over a leak into his property.
    2. Handling of the associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is a shared-ownership leaseholder. The property is a third floor, 3-bedroomed flat within a block of similar properties. The landlord holds the head lease for the property. The superior landlord contracts a managing agent (the agent) to handle repairs and maintenance at the block.
  2. The resident first reported a leak to the managing agent on 8 May 2023. He said that a significant volume of water was leaking into his property from above.
  3. The resident made a stage 1 complaint to the landlord on 2 August 2023 in which he said he was unhappy that the agent had not yet repaired the leak. He relayed that the agent had told him it had difficulty accessing the site of the leak on the exterior of the block. The resident was unhappy that he had heard nothing else since and was experiencing damp and mould in his property from the leak.
  4. The landlord issued its stage 1 complaint response to the resident on 23 April 2024. It relayed an update from the agent which said it had attempted to inspect the site of the leak but this was inaccessible. It also relayed the agent’s apology for the delay and its plan to source equipment to inspect the leak. It said it would update the resident by 31 August 2023 on whether the agent agreed to assist with internal repairs and whether it would compensate him.
  5. The resident attempted to escalate his complaint to the final stage of the landlord’s procedure on 23 and 29 August 2023. He continued to be unhappy because:
    1. The agent had not accepted responsibility for completing the external repair to resolve the leak.
    2. He remained unhappy that the repair was incomplete after 3 months and wanted assurances of how long a repair should take in future.
    3. He wanted clarification of whether the agent would repair the interior of his property and pay compensation.
  6. The agent carried out a surveyor’s inspection on 15 November 2023. The final report from this was published on 15 December 2023. The landlord carried out its own inspection of the property on 18 January 2024. On 15 March 2024, the agent issued a section 20 notice of intention to carry out works. The consultation period for this ended on 19 April 2024.
  7. The landlord issued its final stage complaint response to the resident on 22 December 2023. It said that the agent did not provide its surveyor’s report from the inspection on 15 November 2023 until 5 weeks later. It said that, because of the agent’s delay in repairing the leak, it had instructed a solicitor to prompt the agent to act. The landlord apologised that its final response was late and offered £100 compensation for this.
  8. The agent issued a second section 20 notice on 25 April 2023, with the consultation period set to end on 30 May 2024. The remedial work to repair the leak then began on 29 July 2024.
  9. The resident told us on 15 October 2024 that the leak had been resolved and internal repairs and decorations in his property had been completed satisfactorily. He remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s handling of the matter and its communication, which he felt was dismissive. The resident said the landlord had not been accurate about its intentions to pursue legal action.

Scope of investigation

  1. The Housing Ombudsman Scheme sets out that we are only able to investigate complaints about a landlord who is a member of the Scheme. The managing agent was contracted by the superior landlord. There was no legal relationship between the landlord and the agent, nor the resident and the agent. Neither the agent, nor the superior landlord are members of the Scheme. Therefore, we have considered the actions of the landlord alone in response to the concerns raised by the resident.
  2. Since the investigation can only consider the actions of the landlord, we are only considering events from 2 August 2023. This is the date that the resident first made the landlord aware of the leak.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns over a leak into his property

  1. The resident pays service charges to the landlord which includes a management fee. Its service charge annual review explains “This fee is to cover our costs in dealing with any issues with the Managing agent on your behalf.” This confirms that the landlord was responsible for dealing with the agent to represent the resident’s concerns.
  2. The landlord’s lease agreement with the superior landlord confirms that the agent was responsible for the repair and maintenance of the resident’s property. Therefore, the landlord was unable to carry out a repair itself. In the circumstances, the landlord’s responsibility was to deal with the agent on behalf of the resident and take reasonable steps to ensure that the agent carried out the repair. The landlord would be expected to maintain contact with the agent while the repair remained outstanding, obtain regular updates on progress and relay these to the resident. It should have chased the agent when there was no evidence of progress, and if the repair remained unresolved, then it could have pursued legal action.
  3. The landlord has provided the Ombudsman with an account of events which states that it maintained regular contact with the resident while the repair remained outstanding. It has also provided call logs, however not all of these are dated and not all the events in its account of events are evidenced. There is insufficient contemporaneous evidence to substantiate all the events it described. This was a record keeping failure by the landlord.
  4. The Ombudsman would expect a landlord to keep a robust record of contacts, yet the evidence has not been comprehensive in this case. It is vital that landlords keep clear, accurate and easily accessible records to provide an audit trail. If we investigate a complaint, we will ask for the landlord’s records. If there is disputed evidence and no audit trail, we may not be able to conclude that an action took place.
  5. There was evidence, in the landlord’s call logs, of the resident chasing it for updates and him expressing frustration with the lack of communication. Based on the available evidence, it is not possible to conclude that the landlord communicated with the resident regularly and or provided clear updates.
  6. The landlord updated the resident on the agent’s progress in attempting to address the leak in its stage 1 complaint response on 23 August 2023 and in a meeting on 31 August 2023. However, there was no evidence that the landlord actively pursued a resolution to the leak or updated the resident until 23 November 2023, when it said that the report from the agent’s surveyor was not yet available.
  7. It was positive that the landlord carried out its own inspection of the resident’s property on 18 January 2023. It was reasonable for it to relay this to the agent, since it corroborated the agent’s surveyor’s report in part. However, there was no evidence that followed up with the agent to seek its response to this. The landlord may have missed an opportunity to speed up the repair of the leak.
  8. During the period between August 2023 and January 2024, there were multiple calls from the resident to the landlord seeking updates. There is limited evidence of it responding to these and this indicates a failure by the landlord to keep the resident informed. It was positive then that, on 27 February 2024, the landlord met with the resident and agreed a weekly schedule of contact, through video conferencing, until the repair was resolved. However, it would have been reasonable for it to have arranged this sooner when it became clear that progress on the repair was slow.
  9. The landlord said, in its final stage complaint response to the resident on 23 April 2024, that it had instructed a solicitor to prompt the agent to complete the repair. Its own account of events said that it had begun seeking legal advice in January 2024, which ended on 15 March 2024. This coincided with the agent issuing the first section 20 notice. The landlord’s account said that the solicitors had concluded that no further action was appropriate at that time as the agent was progressing efforts to complete the work.
  10. While the Ombudsman has not been provided with the evidence of the landlord’s contact with the solicitor, its account was consistent with the events. It would not be appropriate for the landlord to pursue legal action to progress the work while a section 20 consultation was taking place. It was unreasonable then that it told the resident, in its final complaint response, that it had started legal action. This was an inaccurate representation of events and may have raised the resident’s expectations of an imminent resolution.
  11. The Ombudsman’s “Spotlight on: Landlords’ engagement with private freeholders and managing agents – Where regulated and unregulated sectors meet” report sets out various recommendations. One of which is “Landlords should review their operational response to service or repair requests in buildings owned and managed by third parties to ensure they are effective, including provision of interim support and maintaining accurate and robust records.” The landlord has provided its action plan in response to this report, and it is positive that it is in the process of addressing this recommendation. However, in this case, it did not provide accurate and robust records, and it was inconsistent in offering the resident interim support.
  12. Overall, the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns over the leak amounts to service failure. It missed opportunities to press the agent to act sooner in the initial investigation of the leak, and again when both the agent and its inspections were completed. There was a lack of evidence that it communicated with the resident in a timely manner. Its failures are mitigated by the landlord being limited in what it could to influence the progress of the repair and it is not clear that its efforts would have significantly speeded up the process.
  13. To recognise the distress and inconvenience experienced by the resident from the landlord’s failures, we will order it to pay him £200 compensation. This is in accordance with our remedies guidance, which is available on our website. This sets out that awards of compensation between £100 and £600 are appropriate when there has been a failure by the landlord which had an adverse effect on the resident, but which did not have a permanent impact on them. This award of £200 recognises that the failures identified would have added to the distress and inconvenience the resident experienced over several months while the leak remained unresolved.

The landlord’s handling of the complaint

  1. The landlord’s complaints policy says it has a 2-stage internal complaints procedure. The policy says that it will acknowledge complaints within 5 working days of receipt at both stages. At stage 1 the landlord should provide its response within 10 working days, and at the final stage it should respond within 20 working days. The policy states that, when a more time is required to respond, it will explain why and agree an extension with the resident.
  2. The resident raised his stage 1 complaint with the landlord on 1 August 2023, and the landlord responded on 23 August 2023. This was after 17 working days. There was no evidence that it agreed an extension with the resident. It therefore failed to respond within its published timeframes at stage 1. However, this was not a significant delay, and the landlord acknowledged and apologised for this.
  3. The resident escalated his complaint to the final stage of its procedure on 23 August 2023. He chased the landlord for updates on his complaint on at least 6 occasions up to 13 December 2023. However, the landlord failed to acknowledge the complaint. It eventually issued him with its final complaint response on 22 December 2023. This was 5 months after the resident escalated his complaint. This was an excessive delay and was a failure to adhere to its published timeframe for responding to a final stage complaint. There was no evidence that the landlord gave a good reason why the complaint was delayed for so long.
  4. The landlord offered the resident £100 compensation for its delayed final stage complaint response. There was no evidence that the time taken by the landlord to issue the final stage complaint would have influenced the overall progress of resolving the leak. Nor was there evidence that the delayed response led to a permanent effect on the resident, as the repair to the leak and the interior of the resident’s property were ultimately completed.
  5. However, the significant delay caused the resident distress. The landlord’s delay in responding to his complaint would have exacerbated his concerns that it was not taking his concerns seriously. He also expended time and trouble in pursuing the complaint. The Ombudsman’s dispute resolution principles are to ‘be fair, put it right, and learn from outcomes’. Since the landlord did not explain why it had taken so long to respond to the resident’s complaint, it did not demonstrate that it had learned from this failure. As such, it could not provide any assurance that it would not repeat the same failure.
  6. Therefore, the landlord’s handling of the complaint amounts to maladministration. While it was positive that the landlord offered the resident £100 compensation for its complaint handling failure, this was insufficient. We will order the landlord to pay the resident £150 compensation, inclusive of the £100 it has already offered, to recognise the detriment he experienced. This award is in line with our remedies guidance, mentioned above.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was:
    1. Service failure by the landlord in its response to the resident’s concerns over a leak into his property.
    2. Maladministration by the landlord in its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. Within 4 weeks, the landlord must provide evidence to the Ombudsman that it has complied with the following orders:
    1. Pay the resident compensation of £350. This is made up of:
      1. £200 for its failures in the handling of the leak.
      2. £150 for its complaint handling failures. The landlord may deduct the £100 it previously offered him for this if it can evidence it has already paid this.
    2. Write to the resident to apologise for its failures in the handling of this case. This apology must come from a senior member of staff at director level or above and comply with our guidance for apologies in our remedies guidance. This letter should also clarify what the landlord’s responsibilities are if a similar repair occurs in future and outline what expectations the resident may have of its handling of similar repairs. This should include timeframes for communication and clarify which staff or departments would be responsible for handling the issue.