One Housing Group Limited (202321871)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202321871

One Housing Group Limited

17 June 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 heater replacement work.

Background

2. The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord. The property is a 1-bedroom flat. The landlord is a housing association.
3. The resident raised her complaint on 25 July 2023. She told the landlord that she was still awaiting contact from its contractor about heating issues. On 8 August 2023, the landlord issued its stage 1 response. It said:
   1. Its attempts to speak to the resident about her complaint were unsuccessful.
   2. It received reports of faulty heaters on 7 June 2023 and attended the property on 14 June 2023. It referred the matter to a heating specialist contractor on 1 August 2023 and despite attempts its contractor was unable to reach the resident.
   3. It accepted there was a delay between 14 June 2023 and 1 August 2023. It apologised for this and said the matter should have been referred to its contractor within a reasonable time. It had spoken to its repairs team about future referrals.
   4. It asked the resident to confirm a suitable date for its contractor to attend and complete an inspection.
   5. It partially upheld the complaint due to the delay. It offered £50 compensation and said this was in line with its compensation policy.
4. The resident escalated her complaint on 9 and 17 August 2023. She said she had spoken to the contractor and it was not aware of the work required.
5. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 15 September 2023. It said:
   1. An order was open with its contractor and it had sent an email for its repairs team to urgently follow up. It would follow up again on Monday.
   2. A learning point for it was to ensure all jobs were followed up with a confirmation and estimated timescales for remediation issued to residents.
   3. It partially upheld the complaint and said this was due to the long delays with its contractor. It said the active repair was with its contractor and could be resolved early the following week.
   4. It increased its compensation offer to £100 and said this was to compensate for the delay in completing the repair.
6. The resident remained unhappy with the landlord’s response and outstanding work and referred the matter to this Service for further consideration. The landlord completed work to the heaters on 29 December 2023.

Assessment and findings

Handling of heater replacement work

7. The tenancy agreement says the landlord should keep in repair and proper working order installations it provides including, amongst other things, heating installations.
8. The landlord’s responsive repairs policy details its repairs timeframe of 4 hours to make safe for emergency repairs and 28 calendar days for routine repairs, amongst other things.
9. The landlord’s compensation policy says it can award discretionary payments for different levels of impact. For low impact this can be payments of £50 to £200, medium impact can be payments between £200 – £500 and for high impact it can make payments more than £500.
10. It is noted that the resident has said she reported issues with the heating in January 2023. While this is acknowledged, this Service has not been provided with evidence to show what was reported in January 2023. The available evidence shows a separate issue was reported in March 2023 and following this, the landlord and resident were in communication about an appointment for the heating in June 2023. As such, with the evidence available, it is reasonable to conclude that the landlord was made aware of issues with the heating by no later than June 2023.
11. The evidence shows that the resident contacted the landlord on 2 June 2023 about an appointment it had made for 8 June 2023. The landlord’s inspection from 14 June 2023 found the property did not have sufficient heaters to heat the whole property. At that time, the landlord told the resident heating issues were not treated as emergency repairs between the months of April and October. This was reasonable in attempts to manage the resident’s expectations. While the landlord’s repairs log recorded the work as a routine repair (28 days), it did not complete the work within this timeframe. This was not appropriate.
12. It took the landlord until 1 August 2023, after its routine repair timeframe had exceeded, to refer the matter to its contractor. It is unclear why it took the landlord around 7 weeks to refer the matter to its contractor and there is no evidence to show it kept the resident updated at that time. This was not appropriate.
13. Within the landlord’s stage 1 response it said its contractor had made attempts to contact the resident. The landlord has not provided evidence to show these attempts. However, following this the resident told it she spoke to its contractor on 7 August 2023 and the contractor was not aware of the work required at the property. It took the landlord until its stage 2 response, on 15 September 2023, to tell the resident that it would follow up the matter. However, it did not complete the work until December 2023. This timeframe of 6 months to complete work was not appropriate and significantly exceeded its routine repair timeframe.
14. The evidence shows that the landlord and contractor’s relationship was challenging at times. However, the landlord should have measures in place to ensure its residents are not impacted by contractual issues. The evidence shows, the landlord/contractor relationship contributed to the delays experienced by the resident and the landlord took too long to complete work. This was not appropriate.
15. Overall, the landlord was aware, following its inspection in June 2023, that the property was not sufficiently heating. While this was in the summer months, it took the landlord until 5 December 2023 to offer the resident an alternative heating source and until 29 December 2023 to resolve the issue. The landlord’s handling of the installation of heaters at the property was not appropriate and it significantly exceeded its routine repair timeframe. The landlord’s failings amount to maladministration.
16. Within the landlord’s stage 2 response, from September 2023, it said it had learnt lessons to ensure all jobs were followed up with confirmations and estimated timescales for remediation. However, despite what it said, it did not follow up with a confirmation or provide the resident with timescales for the completion of work.
17. The landlord took until 29 December 2023 to complete work. While the repair was outstanding, it did not proactively manage the repair and it did not keep the resident updated. This meant the resident had to continually contact it about outstanding work. This would have added to the resident’s frustration with its service, especially as she told it of the impact its handling of the matter was having on her.
18. It is noted that within the landlord’s stage 2 response, it offered the resident £100 compensation for the delay. Here the landlord acknowledged its delay to complete work and its compensation offer shows some attempt to put things right. The landlord did eventually complete work. However, it significantly exceeded its repair timeframes, continued to cause delay and its compensation offer was not proportionate to the impact its failings would have had on the resident over a prolonged time.
19. When considering the landlord’s failings, the Ombudsman considers it more appropriate to increase the compensation offer to £400 (inclusive of the £100 already offered). This amount falls within the medium impact banding of the landlord’s compensation policy and the maladministration banding of this Service’s remedies guidance.

Determination

20. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of heater replacement work.

Orders

21. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord is ordered to:
    1. Arrange for a manager to apologise to the resident for the failings identified within this report.
    2. Pay the resident a total compensation of £400 for the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused by its handling of heater replacement work. This amount includes the £100 it previously offered, if this has not been paid already.
    3. Provide evidence of compliance with the above orders.