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One Vision Housing Limited (202316212)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202316212

One Vision Housing Limited

Final Report

18 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 the resident’s reports of foul smells from drains in the property.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant of the property, a maisonette owned by the landlord. He lives with his child, and both have ongoing mental health conditions.
  2. On 3 May 2023, the resident reported a strong foul smell coming from drains in his property. The landlord arranged an appointment and attended on 11 May 2023. It could not access the property. It reattended on 26 May 2023 and found that it needed further investigation of the toilet pipework. It attended on 22 June 2023 but could not find the issue with the equipment it had.
  3. As the smell remained, the resident complaint to the landlord on 3 July 2023. He asked it to either fix the problem or move him and his son to a different property.
  4. The landlord sent its stage 1 complaint response to the resident on 17 July 2023. The details of this letter are unknown due to an administration error. However, he asked that it escalate his complaint to stage 2 of its process on the same day as he felt he was getting nowhere, and the smell remained.
  5. In its stage 2 response of 2 August 2023, the landlord told the resident that following unsuccessful appointments to repair the toilet pipework, it had booked an appointment for 10 August 2023 to complete works. It offered compensation of £390 as a resolution to his complaint.
  6. Following the appointment on 10 August 2023, it was identified that additional works were needed and scaffolding was required. The repairs were completed om 27 October 2023.
  7. The resident remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response to his complaint and asked the Ombudsman to investigate.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident has also told the landlord and the Ombudsman that the ongoing issues with foul smells have caused difficulties with his and his son’s mental health. He has also expressed concern about the long-term impact of this on their physical health.
  2. The courts are the most effective place for disputes about personal injury and illness. This is largely because independent medical experts are appointed to give evidence. They have a duty to the court to provide unbiased insights on the diagnosis, prognosis, and cause of any illness or injury. When disputes arise over the cause of an injury, oral testimony can be examined in court. Therefore, this element to the resident’s complaint is better dealt with via the court.
  3. The evidence provided in this case shows that the resident reported issues with smells from drains ahead of moving into the property in 2021 and again in April 2022. However, these reports did not form part of a formal complaint. As such, this Service has only considered events that occurred from his renewed contact with the landlord on 3 May 2023. Any further mention of historical matters before this date is only for context within this report.

Reports of foul smells

  1. The landlord’s outlines its response times for repairs in its repairs and maintenance policy, as follows:
    1. It will attend emergency repairs to complete works or make safe within 24 hours.
    2. It will attend and complete urgent repairs within 5 working days (7 calendar days).
    3. It will respond to and complete all routine repairs within 20 working days (28 calendar days) of the date of notification.
  2. While unpleasant, there was nothing to suggest that the foul smell reported by the resident on 3 May 2023 needed an emergency response from the landlord. It logged the report as a standard repair and tried to attend on 11 May 2023. It could not access the property. This was prompt first response, in line with its repairs policy.
  3. The landlord raised works again on 24 May 2023, this time as an emergency, and sent this to its contractor. They (the contractor) sent a report to the landlord on 26 May 2023. They recommended a CCTV survey of the toilet pipework to find any issues and plan any required works. It returned to do this on 22 June 2023, just within its policy timescale for routine repairs. On this date, it found that it needed further investigation due to the pipework layout.
  4. In the resident’s complaint of 3 July 2023, he said the landlord had plenty of time to deal with the smell but had failed to do so. He described the smell as intermittent during the prior 18 to 20 months but said he felt it had not taken his reports seriously. He expressed concern for the effect the situation had on his and his son’s mental health, along with the potential for any physical health issues.
  5. The landlord’s repairs records show that it completed a pre-inspection for works on 10 July 2023. From this, on 12 July 2023, it recommended that its contractor repair a displaced joint in the pipework approximately 1.5 metres below the toilet. It booked these works for 27 July 2023. While this exceeded its policy timescale for routine repairs, it was important for the landlord to fully investigate the issue before booking works to avoid later issues.
  6. The landlord has been unable to provide a full copy of its stage 1 complaint response. However, it did so on 17 July 2023. The resident requested escalation of his complaint on 18 July 2023. He said it had given him no timescale for a resolution to the smell.
  7. The resident spoke to the landlord on 31 July 2023 to report that contractors did not complete works on 27 July 2023. The operative said that they were unable to do anything. It queried this internally and the operative had noted that the landlord should consider asking its contractor to find the issue more accurately before completing works. However, the landlord’s complaints team noted that it should have been aware of all works and asked internally for it to book a new appointment.
  8. In its stage 2 response of 2 August 2023, the landlord said its contractors attended on 11 June 2023 and found a displaced joint about 1.5 metres down from the toilet. It attended on 13 June 2023 to complete the works but arrived too late to do so. It did not include records of these appointments as part of the provided evidence. It confirmed a new appointment date of 10 August 2023 to complete works. It offered compensation of £390 as a resolution to his complaint but did not apologise for the delays.
  9. At the time of the landlord’s complaint response, over 60 working days had passed since the resident’s first report on 3 May 2023. As such, its offer of compensation was reasonable when considering our remedies guidance. However, its failure to apologise for the delays was not fair when considering the issues with unsuccessful repair appointments.
  10. The landlord completed a temporary repair to the pipe on 10 August 2023 and raised further works to renew the pipework on 18 August 2023. There were further problems with missed appointments and the landlord completed works on 27 October 2023, almost 6 months later. The evidence shows that the resident was consistently chasing it for updates and showing clear distress.
  11. The evidence shows that the scope of works changed on 25 August 2023, namely that scaffolding was required in order to complete the works. While it is acknowledged that the works were not completed until October 2023, the landlord was not solely responsible for the time it took to complete the works.
  12. This is because it is recognised that when scaffolding is required, delays will occur as the lanldord has to consider a number of factors. In this case, the landlord identified that vehicles needed to moved from a specific area and therefore had to give local residents notice.
  13. The landlord’s compensation policy does not define the amount it will offer for any service failure. We have published remedies guidance which landlords will often use as a guide for their offers. In line with this, its offer of £390 is within the bracket for maladministration. This covers failures which adversely affected a resident.
  14. As the amount offered by the landlord was in line with the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies which confirms payments of between £100 – £600 are due when a landlord’s failures have negatively impacted a resident, a finding of reasonable redress has been made.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53.b of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was reasonable redress in respect of the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of foul smells from drains in the property.

Final recommendations

  1. It Is recommended that the landlord:
    • Pay the resident £390 compensation as previously offered. The finding of reasonable redress is dependant on this. 
    • Contact the resident regarding the new issues he has reported and raise a formal complaint if necessary.