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Shepherds Bush Housing Association Limited (202217273)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202217273

Shepherds Bush Housing Association Limited

9 December 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 leaseholder 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 leaseholder’s reports of a roof leak.
  2. The Ombudsman has also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

  1. The leaseholder of the property complained to and corresponded with the landlord as the freeholder of the building. However, she has sub-let the property, which is a 1-bedroom 2nd floor flat, since 2014.
  2. On 21 February 2022, the landlord received a roof survey report. This concluded that the roof of the block in which the property is situated was past its serviceable life. The survey report recommended that the existing flat roof was stripped back and replaced.
  3. On 14 September 2022, the landlord raised a repair order for a surveyor to attend the building to assess the roof for a temporary repair. The surveyor noted that water was penetrating the roof membrane in many locations and recommended that the landlord replaced the roof as soon as possible. They also suggested some measures for a short-term temporary fix.
  4. The leaseholder complained on 18 September 2022. She said that she had first reported issues with the roof in 2016 and 2017 and was aware that other leaseholders had also reported problems. She said that the leaseholders had discussed the roof with the landlord at multiple meetings and it had told them that inspections and surveys had been undertaken. However, despite numerous requests, the landlord had not provided copies of the survey reports and now it said it would not share them. She included a timeline of issues with roof leaks commencing 2016. As a resolution, she asked for the full disclosure of the survey reports so far, details of the warranties in place for the roof, and an action plan with targets for completion of work to rectify the issue.
  5. The landlord acknowledged receipt of the complaint on 20 September 2022 and said it would respond by 3 October 2022. On 7 October 2022, it advised the leaseholder that it would respond to the complaint by 13 October 2022.
  6. On 21 October 2022, a contractor provided the landlord with a completion report for some repairs to the roof. The contractor recommended that the landlord also repaired the other half of the roof.
  7. On the same date, the landlord told the leaseholder that, due to delays in investigating her complaint, it would escalate it straight to stage 2 of the complaint process.
  8. The landlord provided a stage 2 complaint response on 8 November 2022, which included the following:
    1. It provided a copy of the roof survey from February 2022 and said that its contractors had completed some repairs. However, this had not resolved the issue.
    2. It said that it had discovered that a like for like replacement of the roof would not be possible due to changes in building regulations.
    3. It said that it had completed patch repairs of the roof which had invalidated the roof guarantee and therefore it would fund the roof replacement itself and not recharge leaseholders.
    4. It said that the roof replacement work would start in January 2023 and that it would be onsite the next day to see if any further temporary repairs were required in the meantime.
    5. It upheld the complaint. It apologised for its lack of communication and the lack of progress to permanently remediate the roof issue. It also apologised for the delay in its complaint response and offered £25 compensation for this.
  9. The replacement of the roof was completed in April 2024.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The leaseholder advised us that she reported leaks between 2016 – 2021. The Ombudsman has not investigated the landlord’s handling of these reports. The Ombudsman encourages residents to raise formal complaints with their landlords in a timely manner. Therefore, taking into account the availability and reliability of evidence, it is considered fair and reasonable for this assessment to focus on the landlord’s actions in the 12-month period prior to her formal complaint. This is also in accordance with paragraph 42(c) of the Scheme which says that the Ombudsman may not consider complaints that were not brought to the attention of the landlord within a reasonable period of the matter occurring, normally being within 12-months. The previous leaks have been referenced only to provide the background context to the leaseholder’s complaint.
  2. Further information has also been provided on activities that took place after the stage 2 complaint response. Any reference to these events is for context only and has not otherwise been considered. This is because events that occurred after the date of the final response will not have been addressed via the landlord’s complaint process. The resident has the option to raise these as a new formal complaint with the landlord in the first instance.

Roof leak

  1. The lease agreement between the landlord and leaseholder states that the landlord will maintain and repair the roof and main structure of the building.
  2. The landlord correctly took responsibility for repairing the roof. However, although an expert recommended that the roof was past its serviceable life in February 2022, it did not complete a replacement until April 2024. Throughout this time, during heavy rainfall, the leaseholder advised us that water would enter the property near the front door and through light fittings which caused damage to flooring. Although she was not resident in the property, this long delay would have cost her time and trouble because she would have dealt with the enquiries made by her sub-tenant.
  3. The leaseholder informed this Service that she initially reported the leak in 2016. She said that due to the number of issues reported by various leaseholders due to the leaking roof, the landlord held regular leaseholder meetings. We asked the landlord to provide evidence of her reports of the leak and minutes of the leaseholder meetings held during the year prior to the complaint. The repairs logs provided by the landlord showed no reports made by the leaseholder or her representative about the roof leak and several copies of the minutes were also not provided.
  4. A landlord should have systems in place to maintain accurate records of repair reports, responses, inspections, and investigations. Good record keeping is vital to evidence the action a landlord has taken and failure to keep adequate records indicates that the landlord’s processes are not operating effectively. Staff should be aware of a landlord’s record management policy and procedures and adhere to these, as should contractors or managing agents. Given the above, there has been a failure in the landlord’s record keeping and the lack of evidence provided has hampered an investigation into the root causes of the delays in this case.
  5. The landlord did not keep the leaseholder adequately informed about the outcome of the survey and the action it intended to take. It told her that the survey had been completed but did not communicate its position regarding the outcome of it until she complained in September 2022. The landlord apologised for its poor communication within the stage 2 complaint response and said that it had failed in this regard. These communication failings cost the leaseholder time and trouble because she had to complain to obtain the required information.
  6. The landlord advised the leaseholder that the original roof warranty was no longer valid because it had undertaken several patch repairs to the roof. However, it said that it would improve its record keeping around guarantees in the future. Due to this error it also agreed to fund the roof replacement itself rather than recharging leaseholders. This was an appropriate action to take.
  7. The landlord acknowledged that its communication was poor and apologised for this in the stage 2 complaint response. However, it did not recognise the time and trouble taken by the leaseholder due both to this failing and the long delays in replacing the roof. Its compensation and goodwill gesture policy says that it can offer compensation when an apology alone is not good enough, for example when there have been unreasonable delays. However, it did not follow this policy and take the opportunity to put things right. Therefore, an order to pay £300 compensation for the time and trouble taken by the leaseholder due to the delays and poor communication has been made. This is in line with the Housing Ombudsman’s remedies guidance.
  8. Due to the poor communication, lengthy delays, and poor record keeping identified there has been maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the roof leak.

Complaint Handling

  1. The landlord’s complaint policy says that it operates a 2-stage complaint process. It says that it will provide a stage 1 complaint response in writing within 10 working days of receipt of a complaint. It says that if it cannot adhere to this timescale it will seek to agree an alternative response time with the complainant on a case-by case basis. The Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code (the Code) in place at the time of the complaint also said that there should be 2 stages to the complaint process.
  2. The landlord did not provide a stage 1 complaint response at all and therefore did not adhere to its own policy or the Code. The 2-stage process is important to ensure that the initial response is subject to internal review by an alternative officer. This will help to ensure that the investigation has been carried out thoroughly and all avenues of redress have been explored.
  3. The landlord also failed to communicate its delay to the leaseholder at the earliest opportunity, as required by its policy and the Code. It would have been good practice for the landlord to contact the leaseholder and explain the full reasons for the delay. It could then have sought to agree a timescale extension with her. Its failure to do so left her unclear when the complaint would be resolved.
  4. The landlord offered £25 compensation for its complaint handling failures. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme, the level of compensation offered by the landlord is in line with the Ombudsman’s awards set out in the remedies guidance. This Service therefore finds that there was reasonable redress in the landlord’s complaint handling.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the roof leak.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme there was reasonable redress offered by the landlord for its complaint handling.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

  1. Within 6 weeks of the date of this report the landlord must:
    1. Apologise to the leaseholder in writing for the failings identified by this investigation.
    2. Pay compensation of £300 for the time and trouble caused by its handling of the roof leak.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 54(g) of the Scheme, a senior member of staff must carry out a review of this case to identify the cause of the record keeping failures. It should provide a report regarding these to the Ombudsman within 12 weeks of the date of this report.
  3. The landlord must provide the Ombudsman with evidence of compliance with these orders by the above deadlines.

Recommendations

  1. If the landlord has not already done so it should pay the £25 previously offered for the inconvenience caused by its complaint handling failure.