Sanctuary Housing Association (202324827)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202324827

Sanctuary Housing Association

30 April 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 requests for repair of a wet room.
2. We have also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

3. The resident has been an assured tenant of the landlord, a housing association, since November 2012 (with a starter tenancy for the year before). The property is a 2-bedroom bungalow. The landlord has recorded vulnerabilities for the resident due to her disability.
4. On 27 July 2023 the resident logged a complaint via the landlord’s web form. She said:
   1. She had reported a repair for an electric shower in March 2023 which was resolved in April 2023. At the same time she had been waiting for wet room repairs. She had reported repairs to the drain, a replacement dropdown grab rail, and rusted screws protruding from the toilet base.
   2. The landlord’s contractor attended on 12 June 2023 with a new gully and said a new grab rail was on order. However, the repair could not be done as the contractor discovered the piece underneath the drain was crumbling and needed to be replaced.
   3. She was told the wet room floor would have to be lifted and replaced which was a specialist job. The contractor said they would quote the landlord and then all the work (floor, drain, grab rail, rusty screws) would be done at the same time.
   4. She had phoned the landlord and the contractor for updates, and each had blamed the other for the delay and no communication. She was promised an update by the landlord on the last call, which was not provided.
   5. Due to her disability and health conditions, the outstanding repairs posed health and safety risks.
5. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 4 August 2023 and said:
   1. It was sorry for the trouble and inconvenience caused, and for the time it had taken to respond to the complaint.
   2. It could not do the reported repair until it had repaired the floor. A new quote had to be submitted and authorised for this before it could proceed. The quote was approved on 27 July 2023 and had a repair timeframe of 28 days, making 24 August 2023 the deadline for completion.
   3. It offered £150 compensation (£50 for the delay in drain repair, £50 for the delay in floor repair, and £50 for trouble and inconvenience caused).
6. The resident escalated the complaint on 24 August 2023 as the repair was not done. In its stage 2 response of 15 September 2023 the landlord said:
   1. Records showed issues with the bath/shower had been ongoing since June 2020. It had resolved an earlier complaint in September 2021, so would not consider those events. However, it would consider that the issue was not resolved and caused another complaint.
   2. It had completed repairs on the wet room floor on 6 January 2022. There was no contact about the wet room after this until 17 January 2023, when the resident reported loose screws, a damaged drain, and the extractor fan.
   3. It had booked 3 repair appointments; 25 January 2023 for the screws (recorded complete that day), 20 March 2023 for the extractor fan (recorded complete that day), and 23 March 2023 for drain repairs (rescheduled to 13 April 2023 due to resident availability).
   4. An operative attended on 13 April 2023 and requested an external contractor to reattend the repair. The quote from the contractor was received on 16 May 2023 but it was not approved until 27 July 2023.
   5. Following the resident’s complaint, it contacted the contractor and had been informed the repair was not logged with them. It had then logged the repair with the correct contractor on 6 September 2023. The repair should now be completed no later than 16 October 2023.
   6. It apologised for the inconvenience. Feedback was given to all concerned parties on the importance of excellent customer service and good communication.
   7. In recognition of the inconvenience experienced and the resident’s individual circumstances, it made a revised compensation offer of £925 (inclusive of the previously offered £150) as follows:
      1. £200 for the time, trouble, and inconvenience caused by poor communication and lack of action.
      2. £75 for the delay in wet room repairs.
      3. £75 for the delay in floor repairs.
      4. £150 for the loss of enjoyment of property.
      5. £75 for complaint handling at stage 1.
      6. £200 for the loss of use of facilities.
      7. £150 for future impact up to 26 October 2023.
7. The resident referred her complaint to us on 19 October 2023. She was unhappy that the repairs were still outstanding. She said her physical and mental health had deteriorated due to repeatedly chasing and explaining things to the landlord and its contractors. As a resolution to her complaint, she wanted the repairs to be done.
8. The repairs were completed on 8 March 2024. The landlord wrote to the resident on 10 June 2024 and apologised for the further delay in repairs after its last response. It offered an additional £550 (£150 for loss of enjoyment, £200 for loss of use of facilities, and £200 for the impact of the delays). The resident accepted this and was paid in June 2024.
9. We asked the resident if the complaint was resolved to her satisfaction and, if not, what her desired outcome was. The resident did not respond, so we have assessed the complaint on the available evidence.

Assessment and findings

Wet room repairs

10. The resident has told us that the matters complained of have negatively affected her health. We do not doubt her comments, but it is beyond our remit to decide whether there was a direct link between the landlord’s actions and the resident’s ill-health. She may wish to seek independent advice on making a personal injury claim if she considers that her health was affected by any action or failure by the landlord. While we cannot consider the effect on health, consideration has been given to any general distress and inconvenience which the resident experienced as a result of any service failure by the landlord.
11. The landlord has accepted its own and its contractors’ poor service levels in its complaint responses. Therefore, the question before us is whether those failings amount to maladministration and, if so, whether proper redress was offered to put things right.
12. The landlord’s repair policy categorises repairs and gives associated response times as; emergency (24 hours), appointed repairs (28 days), and planned repairs (no standard timeframe). The resident’s report met the definition of appointed repairs. The landlord did not complete the repairs within its policy timeframes. Some of the delay was due to the discovery of added repairs required before the reported repair could be done. However, the evidence shows delays were also caused by the landlord’s approval process and some jobs not being raised correctly or proactively monitored with its contractors.
13. Evidence shows the resident had to explain the issues to the landlord’s own staff and its contractors repeatedly. She had to make multiple calls to both to get updates and check the repairs were on track. Even when appointments were made, the contractors did not always know the full list of repairs needed.
14. The landlord said a floor repair was needed in its stage 1 response, but in an email of 19 October 2023 it told the resident that lifting the floor was not agreed, after listing the floor repair in the same response. It did not clarify what floor repair was logged with it if lifting it was not a part of that. This shows that, even at that late stage, it had not got a full handle on the repairs or its communication with the resident.
15. The resident was open about her health and safety concerns. She was candid about the impact the prolonged situation was having on her mentally and physically. As the landlord has identified, there were failings in its handling of the repairs.
16. However, the landlord has taken steps after the complaint was logged to redress matters. It has apologised sincerely and provided feedback to reiterate the importance of good customer service and communication. It has also paid the resident £1,400 for the trouble, inconvenience, poor communication, and delays caused by its handling of the repairs. The compensation the landlord offered was proportionate to its failings and in line with our remedies guidance for findings of maladministration.
17. These actions show that the landlord took the complaint seriously, openly acknowledged areas for improvement, and took action to rectify the identified failings. This is in line with our Dispute Resolution Principles: be fair; put things right; and learn from outcomes. We have, therefore, made a finding of reasonable redress. There are no orders on this complaint as the landlord has already offered appropriate and proportionate redress to the resident which satisfactorily resolves the complaint.

Complaint handling

18. Our investigation found the complaint was handled in a timely manner. However, there was some confusion in the landlord’s handling of it. The resident made a complaint on 28 March 2023 about an earlier reported repair of 13 March 2023 about her electric shower. This complaint was resolved and settled in May 2023. However, when the resident logged a separate complaint about her wet room on 27 July 2023, this was registered by the landlord under the existing (shower repair) complaint reference.
19. The resident tried to tell the landlord that her complaint about the wet room was a separate matter. However, it continued to deal with it as part of the previous complaint and issued multiple stage 1 responses under the same reference. This caused confusion not only in its own internal complaint handling but in our consideration and review of the complaint.
20. The landlord has apologised and paid £75 compensation for its complaint handling failures. These actions show that the landlord took the complaint seriously, openly acknowledged areas for improvement, and took action to rectify the identified failings. This is in line with our Dispute Resolution Principles.
21. However, there is no evidence that the landlord identified the above-mentioned confusion or took action to ensure it does not repeat it going forward. The landlord should ensure its staff understand that new issues, even if about the same area such as a wet room, should generally be dealt with as new complaints. This not only allows the landlord and resident clear oversight but helps draw a line under older matters so that the resident can move on from them.
22. Therefore, we have found service failure in the landlord’s complaint handling. As the landlord has already awarded compensation and there was no material adverse effect on the resident of this particular error, we have only ordered the landlord to ensure it learns from its mistake.
23. On 8 February 2024 we issued the statutory Complaint Handling Code (the Code) which sets out the requirements landlords must meet when handling complaints in policy and practice. The new Code applies from 1 April 2024 and we have a duty to monitor compliance with it. We will assess landlords using our Compliance Framework and take action where there is evidence that the requirements set out in the Code are not being met. As a result, no specific order is made on this case with regard to the landlord’s compliance with the Code, and the contents of its policies and procedures in that regard.
24. However, an order is made for the landlord to review its handling of the complaint in this case, alongside the provisions of the Code in order to: understand how the failings occurred; identify areas for improvement; and note where current practices may be at odds with the requirements of the Code.

Determination

25. In accordance with paragraph 53.b of the Scheme, there was reasonable redress offered by the landlord for its handling of the resident’s complaint about repairs to her wet room.
26. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

Orders

27. Within 4 weeks of this report, the landlord is ordered to provide evidence that it has reviewed the complaint handling failures highlighted in this investigation alongside the provisions of the Code.