Peabody Trust (202213344)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202213344

Peabody Trust

31 October 2024

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 concerns about the misuse of the car park.

Background

2. The resident occupies a flat under an assured tenancy agreement with the landlord. The tenancy agreement sets out any additional facilities the resident can use, such as the communal garden, but the sole use or allocation of a parking space was not specified in the terms of the tenancy agreement.
3. The resident is vulnerable. She is partially sighted and has anxiety and depression.
4. Prior to her complaint, the resident said that she had made several reports to the landlord, via telephone and email, that a neighbour was using the car park as a workshop for vehicles. He had electrical cables running from cars in the car park that were plugged into his flat. This had resulted in several abandoned cars and rubbish taking up other residents’ parking spaces and that emergency service vehicles could not park there if needed.
5. When the landlord had taken no action following the resident’s reports, she made a formal complaint in August 2022. She approached this Service for help in October 2022. We wrote on 13 October 2022 instructing the landlord to provide a stage 1 response.
6. The landlord issued its stage 1 complaint response on 22 October 2022. It said it could find no previous reports from the resident on the issue, but had reminded staff of the importance of record keeping. It had inspected the area and sent a letter “of immediate cease” to the neighbour running the business. It would monitor the situation and take the appropriate action if necessary. It also suggested implementing a parking management scheme with its parking contractor, who could issue fines to unauthorised vehicles in bays. This would be subject to a consultation and majority agreement with all residents.
7. The resident escalated her complaint on 28 January 2023. She was unhappy at the lack of evidence of her previous reports. The issue to her was not just the “business”, which she said had not been monitored and despite the “letter of cease”, was still running. It was the fact nuisance cars were not being removed, the neighbour had stolen her parking space and ambulances and visitors could not park. She wanted the bays repainted and numbers on them, which had worked well, until the neighbour’s misuse.
8. The landlord’s stage 2 response dated 27 April 2023 said a resourcing issue had led to her parking concerns being overlooked. It acknowledged lapses in the follow up actions agreed at stage 1, and that it did not escalate her complaint in a reasonable time. It committed to an action plan which included progressing the abandoned vehicle procedure and ensuring the neighbour does not run a car workshop. It offered the resident £850 in compensation.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

9. The resident has also said that the stress and inconvenience of trying to get the landlord to address the car parking issues has adversely affected her health. The Ombudsman does not question the resident’s view on this, but the Ombudsman is unable to draw conclusions on the causation of, or liability for, damage to health and wellbeing.
10. Personal injury claims must, ultimately, be determined by the courts, as the courts can consider medical evidence and make legally binding findings, and award damages. However, the Ombudsman will consider any general distress and inconvenience the situation caused the resident.

Misuse of the car park

11. A car park is attached to the block of flats the resident lives in. This is for residents and their visitors to use. The parking spaces are not allocated, which means usage is on a first come first served basis. The resident said at one point the bays were numbered, and everyone used their own bay. The landlord had no record of this.
12. The resident has been reporting to the landlord for some time that a neighbour is misusing the car park. He was running a vehicle workshop business in the car park. This meant he was permanently taking up several of the parking spaces for his sole use, with unused, damaged and unsightly vehicles. Added to this, dumped rubbish in the car park was taking up other spaces.
13. There are conditions in the landlord’s tenancy agreement that tenants must adhere to. If they do not, the landlord can apply to the courts for possession of the property. These include that residents:
    1. May not operate a business from their home without the prior consent of the landlord.
    2. Must not cause nuisance or annoyance to neighbours or other residents of the landlord.
14. The landlord’s stage 1 response said that it inspected the area and sent a letter to the neighbour concerned, to “immediately cease” the running of the business. It said it would monitor the situation and if the business continued to operate, the neighbourhoods team would take appropriate action. It also proposed a resident consultation to introduce a controlled parking management scheme.
15. This was an appropriate course of action for a breach in tenancy conditions. However, there were no records from the inspection, a report on findings or photographic evidence to support any further action. The landlord did not provide this Service with a copy of its letter to verify that it issued one. There was evidence the neighbour persisted in running the business. It was not evident that the landlord had monitored the situation or taken any further action to address the problem.
16. The resident had declared vulnerabilities. She has mental health issues and problems with her sight. Residents with vulnerabilities can be less resilient when concerns arise and if they are not responded to or in a timely manner.
17. While it is not the Ombudsman’s role to determine whether a resident has a disability, it is our role to look at whether the landlord had considered whether she had where its responsibilities under the Equality Act 2010 would apply. Or to ensure it takes known vulnerabilities into account and provides the sensitive and responsive service the Ombudsman recommends in its Spotlight report on attitudes, respect and rights. 
18. It was not evident from the landlord’s lack of action that the resident’s vulnerabilities had been taken into account. It caused further detriment to the resident as relations with the neighbour deteriorated and her anxiety about access for emergency vehicles increased. It also inevitably led to an escalation in the complaint on 28 January 2023.
19. In its stage 2 complaint response of 27 April 2023, the landlord did acknowledge several service failures. These included complaint handling failings and not following through on the actions that were agreed at stage 1.
20. It apologised, explaining that the resident was a legacy case following a merger between her previous landlord and itself. It accepted this had caused problems, but it was confident a review of its current processes and procedures, to streamline the operations would improve overall service delivery. It offered the resident £250 for failings identified in its handling of her complaint and £600 for her time and trouble.
21. As a resolution to the resident’s outstanding issues in the stage 2 complaint, the landlord appropriately agreed a plan of action. This included ensuring the neighbour was not running a car workshop business from his home. Implementing its process for removing abandoned vehicles. Arranging the removal of rubbish. Starting a parking consultation. Arranging the repainting of the bay lines once it had removed the unauthorised vehicles. Managing any disputes raised because of parking arrangements. All of which were reasonable.
22. The landlord had also recently developed and introduced a parking policy, effective from 1 April 2023, which commits to take action to deal with any abandoned, uninsured and untaxed vehicles on its land and try to deal with individuals causing parking related issues before introducing parking control in its neighbourhoods. 
23. The resident contacted this service on 7 June 2023, because despite the landlord’s assurances in its stage 2 response, it had again not followed through on its agreed actions. The neighbour was still running a business, it had not removed the abandoned cars, the bays had not been repainted and the parking consultation had not commenced. Neither had she received the compensation the landlord had offered totalling £850 (including compensation for complaint handling failings).
24. The purpose of a complaint handling process is to enable landlords to resolve complaints raised by its residents quickly and to use the learning from complaints to drive service improvements. The Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code (the Code) requires that any remedy must clearly set out what will happen and when. In addition, any proposed remedy must be followed through to completion.
25. An internal update during the landlord’s complaint investigation confirmed that there had been significant activity relating to the issues during the stage 2 complaint investigation in March and April 2023. This included the landlord contacting the DVLA and confirming the vehicles did not have an MOT certificate or tax. Visiting the neighbour to discuss running a business from his home, a written request to remove the vehicles and escalating the matter to the next stage in tackling a breach of tenancy conditions
26. It also submitted a request to the local council to have the vehicles removed, however the council responded to say as it was private land, so it was the landlord’s responsibility to arrange removal of the vehicles. The council recommended completing a V888 form with the DVLA to obtain the owners’ details and serve notice of Tort on the vehicles. It said it would complete those actions on 24 March 2023.
27. It was not clear why the landlord did not share with the resident the actions it had taken in March and April 2023 in its stage 2 response. Had it done so, the resident might have felt reassured that she had been listened to and her concerns taken seriously. Instead, she said she felt ignored and discriminated against. This might have been avoided, with better communication.
28. However, the evidence received after the landlord’s complaints process was completed suggests the landlord has done very little since that date in following through with its actions or taking any of the proposed remedies through to completion. 
29. There was evidence from August 2023 that the landlord made some attempts to pursue removing the vehicles. However, it implemented the wrong process internally and did not appear to resolve the issue.
30. A recent update from the resident in September 2024 confirmed this was the case as the parking situation has remained the same. She said the landlord had completed none of the actions set out in its stage 2 response, including paying the compensation it offered to the resident. This was not reasonable.
31. The key aim in any complaint handling process is the earliest resolution of complaints to prevent any further potential detriment to the resident. While the landlord set out a comprehensive list of what actions it would take to resolve the issues with the car parking, it did not provide a timeline and did not have a process in place to monitor complaint outcomes. Consequently, none of the proposed remedies have been followed through to completion. 
32. The landlord’s failure to do what it said it would do not only caused further detriment to the resident, but it has also significantly damaged the landlord tenant relationship. The resident also understandably developed a complete lack of trust and confidence in the landlord’s complaint handling process, which was not reasonable.
33. The Code requires that landlords look beyond the circumstances of the individual complaint to consider whether service improvements can be made as a result of any learning.
34. The landlord’s inaction and repeat of earlier mistakes did not demonstrate that it had taken any learning from the failings identified in the complaint or considered any action to improve its service delivery.
35. In conclusion, the landlord has failed to address the resident’s concerns about the misuse of the car park for 2 years. Twice in its complaint process, it committed to a plan of action and twice it failed to follow the action plans through. It offered financial redress which it did not pay. It failed to communicate effectively with the resident and did not learn from the complaint. This was not reasonable and has led this Service to a finding of maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s concerns over parking.

Determination

36. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s concerns about the misuse of the car park.

Orders

37. The Ombudsman orders that within 4 weeks of the date of this report the landlord provides evidence to this Service of compliance with the following orders:
    1. Sends a written apology to the resident by a senior member of staff for the failings identified in this investigation.
    2. Clarifies the date it intends to begin its consultation on parking management at the block.
    3. Provides the resident with an estimated timeframe for addressing the neighbour running a business from his property (copy to this service).
    4. Pays the resident a total of £1350 compensation, broken down as follows:
       1. £850 previously offered in its stage 2 response for complaint handling, time and trouble.
       2. £500 for the further failure to follow its proposed remedies through to completion.
38. The Ombudsman orders that within 8 weeks of the date of this report the landlord provides evidence to this Service of compliance with the following orders:
    1. Removes the abandoned vehicles and any rubbish from the car park.
    2. Paints new lines for the car parking bays.

Recommendations

39. The Ombudsman recommends the landlord continue with its previous agreement to manage any disputes raised because of parking arrangements.