Nottingham Community Housing Association Limited (202315244)
REPORT
COMPLAINT 202315244
Nottingham Community Housing Association Limited
19 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
- The complaint is about:
- An increase in the resident’s service charge.
- The landlord’s response to the resident’s report of a fault with the communal lighting in her block.
Background
- The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord, a housing association. The property is a 1-bedroom flat in a purpose-built block. The tenancy started in October 2011.
- The landlord’s rent and service charge notification letter dated 22 February 2023 informed the resident of an increase in service charge from £8.71 to £16.99 per week, applicable from 3 April 2023. The resident called the landlord on 27 February 2023 to raise a complaint about the increase to the utility element of the weekly service charge from £0.96 to £8.09. She said this was unacceptable and requested the landlord reduce the charge or move her to a different property. The landlord explained to the resident during the call that the charge was an estimate. It said if it found this to be an overcharge when comparing this with the actual charges at the end of the financial year, overpayments would be carried forward as a surplus to the next year.
- In its acknowledgement of her complaint dated 1 March 2023, the landlord said it would provide a full response within 10 working days. In its stage 1 complaint response dated 13 March 2024, the landlord told the resident:
- It had reviewed her estimated service charges, in particular the utilities charge of £8.09 per week.
- Its finance team had confirmed all calculations were correct.
- All utility costs had increased significantly.
- The utilities charge could not be reduced.
- It was not possible to move the resident to a different property.
- The landlord signposted the resident to information on its website regarding managing , and said she could talk to its ‘money matters’ team if she was struggling to pay bills.
- On 24 March 2023 the resident requested escalation of her complaint to stage 2 of its complaints process.
- During a call with the landlord on 11 April 2023 the resident raised a concern about the communal lighting in her block being on 24 hours, 7 days per week due to a fault with the motion sensor. She believed this may have caused the increase to the utility charge. The resident agreed to the landlord’s request for a 10-working day extension to give it time to investigate the fault with the communal lighting.
- On 24 April 2023 the landlord provided its stage 2 response. Within this, the landlord acknowledged that a fault with the internal lighting which prevented it from turning off, may affect the accuracy of the utility charge. The landlord said:
- Unfortunately, there had been a delay with its contractor investigating the reported fault.
- Its contractor would inspect the communal lighting on 19 May 2023.
- It would carry out a re-setting of the lighting system to restore them to working correctly and then provide a report to its services team who set the service charge.
- It would contact her after it had received the report at the end of May 2023 to confirm what it had identified with the lighting.
- It would not be able to determine difference in cost until after it had received the first and second quarter utilities bill at end of June 2023 and September 2023 respectively.
- It would contact her again in September 2023.
Post the landlord’s final response
- The landlord’s contractor attended the block on 5 July 2023, and they completed the repair to the communal lighting on 16 July 2023. The resident reported that the fault with the sensor had reoccurred approximately 1 month later. The resident recently told us there was still an issue with the communal lighting.
Assessment and findings
Outside of our jurisdiction
- In her formal complaint the resident stated that the increase in the estimate service charge for 2023-24 was unacceptable and unaffordable.
- This Service is unable to consider complaints about the level of, increases or the reasonableness of service charges. This is because these types of complaints are usually considered by the First Tier Tribunal (FTT). The landlord’s rent and service charge notification letter to the resident dated 22 February 2023 also signposted the resident to the FTT to determine any complaints regarding the service charge. Therefore, this aspect of the complaint falls outside of our jurisdiction. We have informed the resident of this.
Scope of investigation
- In July 2023 the resident reported a fault with the external car park lighting. On 17 August 2023 she told the landlord the fault with internal communal lighting had reoccurred. She also complained about the lack of actual meter readings in utility bills provided by the landlord. The resident raised a further formal complaint with the landlord regarding these matters on 17 September 2024.
- We are unable to consider new complaints or events since the landlord’s final stage 2 response dated 24 April 2023 until such time they have exhausted its complaint process. It is noted the landlord declined to accept the resident’s September 2024 complaint. Therefore, we have recommended that the landlord investigate the resident’s complaint in line with its complaint process.
The landlord’s response to the resident’s report of a fault with the communal lighting in her block
- Under the terms of the tenancy agreement, the resident pays a weekly variable service charge for services provided to the communal areas of her block. The landlord’s rents and service charges policy (service charge policy) states it sets service charges annually and that it carries forward any budget surpluses and deficits to the following financial year. This means that where the landlord finds the actual cost of providing a service is less than the estimate it calculated at the beginning of the year, it will carry forward the overpayment to the next year as a credit.
- The resident’s complaint concerns a fault with the internal communal lighting in her block. This fault related to the motion sensor. Normally the communal lights switched off after motion in the communal areas stopped. However, the fault was preventing the lights to switch off meaning they were on 24 hours, 7 days per week.
- The resident first raised this with the landlord on 11 April 2023 after it told her in its stage 1 response that the estimate utility cost for 2023-24 was correct. The resident was concerned the fault had impacted the electricity cost for the block. She said the sensor had been broken for some time. The landlord agreed at this stage for its contractor to visit the resident’s block to investigate the fault.
- In line with its obligations under the tenancy agreement, the landlord had a duty to investigate and fix the reported fault within an appropriate timescale. Therefore, by committing to inspect and repair the lighting, it acted appropriately. We would also expect the landlord to investigate if the fault with the communal lighting was impacting electricity costs. And, for the landlord to explain to the resident how it intended to put this right in the event it found the fault had increased costs.
- At the time the landlord issued its stage 2 final response 13 days later, no inspection of the lighting had been carried out. In its final response the landlord told the resident an inspection would take place on 19 May 2023. It also explained the delay was due to its contractors having a high volume of repair jobs. However, as the resident reported the issue on 11 April 2023, this indicates a failure by the landlord to adhere to the 28-calendar day timescale for routine repairs.
- It is also evident from subsequent communications we have seen between the parties that the landlord failed to carry out the inspection of the lighting on 19 May 2023. It was only after the resident chased the repair on 27 June 2023 that the communal lighting was partially fixed on 6 July 2023 and fully resolved on 16 July 2023. This further delay in repairing the communal lighting was unreasonable.
- In its final response the landlord agreed to review how the delay in repairing the lighting had impacted on electricity usage paid by her and other residents. It explained this may take until September 2023 after it had received the electricity bill for the second quarter of 2023-24. The landlord also said it would let the resident know at this time any impact on the estimated costs for the remainder of 2023-24 and the likely impact on charges for 2024-25. These actions were appropriate.
- While we are unable to investigate events following the date of the landlord’s final response, we expect the landlord to demonstrate it acted on promises made during its complaints process. The evidence shows that in July 2023 the landlord acknowledged it needed to consider the impact of the issue on residents and reiterated it would assess this after receipt of the second quarterly bill from the utility provider in September 2023. However, there is no evidence of the landlord undertaking this review as promised either at this time or at all. Its failure to follow through with its action agreed in the final response was inappropriate. There is also no evidence of the landlord explaining to the resident why it could not carry out this review. This was unreasonable.
- In September 2024, the landlord reconciled the estimated variable service charges for 2023-24 with the actual charges as required under the tenancy agreement. In its internal communication dated 4 October 2024, the landlord stated when calculating the services charges for April 2025-26, it would consider the resident had a £6.91 credit per week which would be offset against her service charges. Within this communication the landlord stated most of the credit was due to the actual electricity costs being less than it anticipated at the time of calculating the service charges for April 2023-24. However, there is no evidence of the landlord informing the resident of its finding that a credit was due to her. Bearing in mind the resident’s complaint, this would have been appropriate in the circumstances. Its lack of action here was unreasonable.
- In summary, there was an unreasonable delay by the landlord in repairing the communal lighting. It also failed to review how the delay in repairing the lighting had impacted on electricity usage paid through the service charge for both 2023-24 and 2024-25 as promised in its final response. This is indicative of maladministration by the landlord when responding to the resident’s report of a fault with the communal lighting in her block.
- We note that approximately 2 months after the final response, the landlord offered to pay the resident £69.92 in compensation for:
- A missed repair (£10)
- For failure to complete a repair (£10).
- A £49.92 refund of the previous year’s (2022-23) utility charge in recognition of the lights not working property over the previous “couple of years”.
- However, the resident did not accept its offer and the landlord paid no compensation or refund to the resident. Therefore, we will not take this offer into account when assessing compensation for distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused to the resident due to failings by the landlord when handling her report of a fault with the communal lighting. However, the landlord told us on 6 February 2025 that it would provide its previous offer to refund £49.92 for 2022-23 as a goodwill payment to all residents in the resident’s block. Therefore, an appropriate order has been included below.
- In the circumstances, an order has been included below for the landlord to pay the resident compensation of £250 for the distress, inconvenience, time, and trouble caused while handling her report. This includes compensation for the missed appointment on 19 May 2023 and failure to complete the repair during the visit on 6 July 2023.
- In view of the resident’s more recent faults reported with the communal lighting, it is reasonable to include a recommendation below for the landlord to address these.
Determination
- In accordance with paragraph 42.d of the Scheme, the Ombudsman will not consider complaints which in our opinion, concern the level of rent or service charge or the amount of the rent of service charge.
- In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in its response to the resident’s report of a fault with the communal lighting in her block.
Orders and recommendations
Orders
- The Ombudsman orders that the landlord, within 4 weeks:
- Provide an apology to the resident for the failings identified in this investigation.
- Pay the resident £250 in compensation for the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble for failings while responding to the resident’s report of a fault with the communal lighting in her block.
- If not already done so provide the goodwill payment of £49.92 to all residents in the resident’s block, as confirmed to us.
- Review how the fault with the communal lighting impacted the electricity bill including what action is appropriate to put this right. It should explain this to the resident.
- Provide us with evidence of compliance with the above orders.
Recommendations
- The Ombudsman recommends that the landlord:
- Responds to the resident’s further stage 1 complaint raised in September 2024 in line with its complaint’s process.
- Address any more recent faults reported with the communal lighting.