Soho Housing Association Limited (202123144)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202123144

Soho Housing Association Limited

31 January 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

The complaint is about the landlord’s responses to the resident’s concerns about:
1. her Housing Moves application, including queries about a mutual exchange.
2. a leak under the kitchen sink.
3. an issue with the guttering.
4. a back door which was in disrepair.
5. the contractors used by the landlord for repairs.
6. lift repairs.
7. staff turnover.
8. complaint handling, including the level of service and communication.
As part of this investigation, the Ombudsman has also looked at the landlord’s approach to knowledge and information management.

Jurisdiction

What we can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. This is governed by the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, (“the Scheme”). When a complaint is brought to the Ombudsman, we must consider all the circumstances of the case as there are sometimes reasons why a complaint will not be investigated.
After carefully considering all the evidence, the Ombudsman considers that the part of the resident’s complaint that relates to staff turnover is outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
Paragraph 42(g) of the Scheme says that the Ombudsman may not consider complaints, which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, concern terms of employment or other personnel issues.
The resident’s remaining complaints are investigated below.

Background and summary of events

The resident is a tenant of the landlord’s property. She moved into the property, which is a 3 bedroom fifth floor flat, by way of mutual exchange in July 2017. The landlord has no vulnerabilities recorded for the resident.
The landlord’s complaints policy splits complaints into informal complaints and formal complaints. At the informal stage, residents are encouraged to tell the landlord about their complaint so that it can try to resolve it an early stage. It does not set out a timeframe for when that resolution is expected to be.
It says its formal complaints stage has 2 stages. It says the first stage will be acknowledged within 3 days and it will aim to respond to the complaint within 10 working days. At stage 2, again, it says it will acknowledge the complaint in 3 working days and a response will be provided in 15 working days.
The Housing Ombudsman Complaints Handling Code, (“the Code”), issued in July 2020, sets out requirements for landlords who are members of the Scheme. Compliance with the Code forms part of the membership’s obligations. Of particular relevance to this investigation, the Code says, among other things:
1. Landlords should use a 2-stage complaints process, with stage 1 taking no longer than 10 working days and stage 2 taking 20 working days. Exceptionally, landlords can provide an explanation if they need an extension to those timeframes. (section 3.11)
2. A complaint should be resolved at the earliest possible opportunity, having assessed what evidence is needed to fully consider the issues, what outcome would resolve the matter for the resident and whether there are any urgent actions required. (section 4.4)
3. A full record must be kept of the complaint, any review and the outcomes at each stage. This must include the original complaint and the date received, all correspondence with the resident, correspondence with other parties and any reports or surveys prepared. (section 4.15)
4. Effective dispute resolution requires a process designed to resolve complaints. Where something has gone wrong a landlord must acknowledge this and set out the actions it has already taken, or intends to take, to put things right. These can include:
  1. acknowledging where things have gone wrong.
  2. providing an explanation, assistance or reasons.
  3. Apologising.
  4. taking action if there has been a delay.
  5. providing a financial remedy. (section 6.1)
5. Any remedy offered must reflect the extent of any service failures and the level of detriment caused to the resident as a result. (section 6.2)
6. Landlords should look beyond the circumstances of the individual complaint and consider whether anything needs to be ‘put right’ in terms of process or systems to the benefit of all residents. (section 6.3)
7. Factors to consider in formulating a remedy can include, but are not limited to, the:
  1. length of time that a situation has been ongoing.
  2. frequency with which something has occurred.
  3. severity of any service failure or omission.
  4. number of different failures.
  5. cumulative impact on the resident. (section 6.4)
The landlord has a responsive repairs policy, dated November 2019. It says it will respond to urgent repairs in 7 calendar days and routine repairs in 28 calendar days.
A scheme called Housing Moves was available to Londoners who lived in social housing from May 2012 to 1 July 2022, when it was closed to most applicants. Priority for lettings through the Housing Moves scheme was given to under-occupiers. However, applications were not accepted from social tenants whose landlords were not set up to take part in the scheme.
Other options for social tenants were to register for a mutual exchange or to apply to the Homefinder UK scheme if a resident was interested in moving out of London.
The resident made a stage 1 complaint to the landlord on 23 October 2021. She said she had unanswered questions and outstanding repairs going back to June 2021 and while she was sorry to complain, felt she had no choice. Her main complaint points were:
1. She said she had reported a leak under the kitchen sink 2 months prior and was “…was fed up of having to keep a pot underneath it.” She explained that her cupboard was swelling up and it was inconvenient to have to store items on her kitchen floor.
2. She said she had also reported broken guttering in June 2021, which again, had not been attended too.
3. She said her back door was in disrepair and had holes, gaps and mould in it. She said it was letting water in.
4. She said that she had applied to Housing Moves in October 2020 and the landlord had still not approved her application.
5. In June 2021 she had asked whether a mutual exchange swap was possible with a family where the family would under-occupy by 1 bed space. She said as the landlord had not replied she had missed out on numerous mutual exchange swaps and had given up.
6. She had asked what the landlord’s policy was about how long it took to answer emails but had not received a response.
On 19 January 2022, having not received a response to her complaint she came to the Ombudsman.
We asked the landlord to respond to the resident’s complaint on the same day. We sent a second request on 17 February 2022, another request on 24 February 2022 and a final request on 12 April 2022.
On 20 July 2022 the landlord apologised to us for its delayed response. It said:
1. It had been in contact with the resident “a few times” regarding outstanding repairs issues.
2. “The leak is in hand and the contractors will attend as soon as possible.” (It provided a copy of an email to the resident which was dated 20 July 2022 and said it had arranged for an operator to fix the leak.)
3. It had sent the resident information regarding the mutual exchange policy questions she had and about its complaints policy.
In relation to the mutual exchange query, it provided the resident with information about what a mutual exchange was and gave her a link setting out where she could apply to exchange. It attached its complaints policy and, on both issues, it said she could contact her housing officer if she would like more information.
On the 27 July 2022 we issued a Complaints Handling Failure Order (CHFO) against the landlord because of its unreasonable delays in accepting or progressing the resident’s complaint. We asked it to provide a stage 1 response to the resident by 3 August 2022.
On 4 August 2022 the resident informed us that the landlord had sent an email to her on 22 July 2022. She said it had failed to acknowledge any failure on its part or answer her specific questions. She said she felt that it did not have any records of all the emails and calls she had been making over the last year and so it was treating her complaint as a fresh complaint. She said she had replied to the landlord the next day asking it to treat her complaint as an existing complaint. She said she had set out her continuing issues.
The landlord has sent us an email from the resident which does not have the date attached. However, we believe the email referenced below is the email the resident told us about in her 4 August 2022 correspondence.
In that email the resident repeated the points she had already made in prior correspondence and added that:
1. She had brought her issues up with 4 separate officers.
2. One officer visited her and said her rotten kitchen cupboard would be replaced when the leak was fixed.
3. If the landlord had responded to her Housing Moves application or answered her query with regard to its mutual exchange policy, she would have been able to bid on cheaper properties. She said she had chased this numerous times by phone and email but it had still not been approved. She said the Housing Moves scheme was now closed to applicants and she had therefore missed out on the chance to downsize and to free up a home for a larger family. She said she was confident she would have moved quickly and saved a lot of money on rent because downsizing applicants have the highest priority.
4. She said she had a family arranged to complete a mutual exchange with but because the landlord did not answer her question about whether a resident could swap if the arrangement left a spare bedroom, she had not been able to go ahead. She had calculated she would have saved £4200 in rent by that point.
5. She had still not been given an answer about callback/response times.
6. Her new housing officer had now arranged for the leak to be fixed next month but she had spent 14 months changing pans daily. She said a lot of water had been wasted in this time and she was on a water meter. She added that in winter she had to use 3 pans a day which meant she could not go out for more than a day or the water would go all over the floor.
7. In relation to her guttering, she said that this was badly broken for a year which caused damage to the outside wall. She said that when a man arrived, unannounced, to fix it, he behaved inappropriately upon arrival, not providing identification. She said his behaviour made her feel intimidated. She said he fixed the guttering by glueing it together and propping it up with a flowerpot that he snapped in half to wedge in the wall. She said her late mother had bought her the flowerpot.
8. She said the contractors the landlord used were not suitable. She said that a contractor employed by the landlord to work on the back door had not known that he had to stir the paint before application and had attended with no identification and without making an appointment.
9. She said the property’s lift had broken many times in the last year, sometimes for “…weeks at a time.”. She explained that as she lived on the top floor, it was a struggle with shopping and some deliveries cancelled as drivers refused to visit the fifth floor without a lift. She complained that the landlord said it would provide £25 but she had not been paid and she was not aware that any other residents had been paid either.
10. She said if the landlord could not find the previous correspondence she had sent it over the past 13 months, it should inform her and she would try to find it.
The landlord did not provide a stage 1 response by 4 August 2022 and on 11 August 2022 we wrote to the landlord. We referred to our CHFO. We said that under paragraph 33 of the Scheme, the Ombudsman may decide that a member’s complaints procedure has been exhausted where, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, there had been repeated failures in the handling of a complaint. We considered this had happened and informed the landlord that we had now passed the case forward for investigation.
On 23 August 2022 the landlord issued a stage 1 response to the resident. The key points were:
1. It apologised for the delay in responding.
2. Having checked its systems, it could not find any record of any formal complaints. Therefore, it had logged this as a new stage 1 complaint. It said it was sorry if the resident had previously raised concerns with her housing officer and not received a response.
3. In relation to her complaint about the landlord not approving her Housing Moves application, the landlord said “…that is a failure on our part that should not have happened.” It offered £50 for its ‘oversight’ to recognise the stress and inconvenience caused. It said there were other options she could use to move and provided information on those.
4. In relation to her mutual exchange query, it said that any application that would leave a spare room would be “...considered on a case by case basis.”
5. In relation to her query about response times to queries, it said staff were expected to respond “…as soon as they are able.”
6. In relation to the reported leak in her kitchen sink it said “…it was disappointing” that this had not been resolved. It asked her to let it know if the contractor had fixed the leak at the next appointment and offered £50 for the delay in arranging the repair.
7. In relation to the guttering repair issue and its contractor’s behaviour, it said that contractors should not be using a resident’s belongings to complete repairs. It said it was sorry to hear about the operative’s behaviour and said if she experienced anything like that in the future to let the landlord know immediately and the operative would be removed from the job. It accepted that it was hard to put a price on the sentimental value of her flowerpot but offered £50 to acknowledge the stress and inconvenience.
8. In relation to the contractors used, it said that contractors should contact residents directly to arrange an appointment and that the operative should have known how to stir paint and behave appropriately on arrival. It said it would use her feedback to inform its future selection of contractors.
9. In relation to her complaint about the lift, it accepted the inconvenience caused by a broken lift, especially when someone lives on the top floor. It said that the £25 offered to residents would be honoured and issued as part of this complaint response.
10. It apologised for the “…poor service [the resident had] received over the last year or so” and hoped that it could improve. It offered a face to face meeting to discuss her concerns if the resident wished.
The resident escalated her complaint to stage 2 on 21 September 2022. Her main points were:
1. She did not consider £50 compensation for having missed out on the opportunity to sign up to the Housing Moves scheme was sufficient and would not make much difference to her large rent arrears.
2. She was grateful for the provision of the mutual exchange policy but said it should not have taken so long.
3. She felt there should be more transparency around response times to queries.
4. She said an operative came to fix her sink in August 2022 but it was leaking again. She said if the landlord kept records, it would see that she had leaks under her sink going back 4 years. She said she considered the pipes needed replacing and did not consider £50 compensation sufficient to cover her ruined items, and time and stress mopping up or the cost of the water.
5. She was grateful that the landlord acknowledged the issue with the guttering. She said she was happy with that response but felt that a heavy rainfall could bring it down again. She felt it should be replaced instead of glued back together.
6. She said she was grateful that the landlord had said it would keep a closer eye on its operatives. She noted that the operative that had attended, whom she had said had not known how to paint properly, also broke a door handle. She said she had replaced it herself and as it was only £17 and she felt the landlord would not get back to her. She said she only mentioned it as “…an example of how upsetting it is trying to chase you up for things every time whilst holding down a full-time job.”
7. She thanked the landlord for the offer of £25 in relation to the lift but noted that she had spoken to neighbours and no one had heard of this offer of compensation.
On 30 September 2022 the landlord acknowledged the resident’s request to escalate to stage 2.
We made enquiries with the landlord in relation to the resident’s complaint on 4 October 2022. It said that it had not responded to the resident’s complaint at stage 2 yet. We informed it that it could still do so and this would be added to the file. It did not provide a stage 2 response. We explained that we had accepted the case for investigation because the landlord had not complied with the CHFO in time.
On 14 October 2022 the landlord provided us with some information. It said, among other things, that:
1. The resident’s initial complaint had been sent to a former member of staff who did not follow the landlord’s process and log it as a complaint.
2. Although the resident said she made an application to Housing Moves, this was not a system that the landlord had access to. It said it provided access to Homeswapper and no formal application was received on that.
3. The resident reported a leak and issues with her guttering on 11 October 2021. The landlord provided an email from the resident on that date, where she said, among other things, that “…Nobody has called me since we spoke a few weeks back. The water is working its way into my flat now. Paint has started peeling on the bathroom wall and a worrying damp circle has appeared on the ceiling above where I sleep.” She also asked for a plumber to attend to the leak under her sink and said, “…it’s been a while now…”. The landlord said the leak was repaired on 30 December 2021. The landlord attached a completion report.
4. It only had records of 1 repair having been raised for the lift since 2019. This was on 5 July 2021 and the records showed it was repaired on the same day.
5. It had tried to contact the resident about progressing to stage 2 of its complaints process but she did not appear to want to engage with it, saying that the complaint was now with the Ombudsman.
The landlord has also provided a copy of an email sent to the resident on 15 July 2021. It is an email from a housing officer and refers to some information that it said was sent to the resident about mutual exchanges. It said it hoped that the information provided was useful and agreed with the resident that “…most local authorities allow under occupying by one room.”
However, it said that the landlord did not currently have a transfer list that was open to residents and so it was unable to assist clients who wanted to move within its housing stock. It said we are “…advising all clients to contact the local authority for assistance if they require a transfer to alternative accommodation.” It also suggested registering on HomeSwappers.
The officer said that at that point, the landlord did not have access to the Housing Moves scheme. It said it would refer the resident to her housing officer who could update her on that.
The email also asked the resident to send a picture of the guttering defect to her housing officer to raise a works order. It said it had raised a work order for her back door and she would be updated on the progress of that work.

Assessment and findings

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about her Housing Moves application including queries about a mutual exchange.

The information the landlord has provided about whether it considered it had failed the resident in this regard is contradictory. We asked for further clarification around this point and it has not been provided. At its stage 1 complaint’s stage it accepted it had failed to approve the resident’s Housing Moves application and offered her £50 in compensation for that failure. Later, it told the Ombudsman that it had not been registered with the Housing Moves scheme. This statement is supported by the email it has provided dated in July 2021, which informed the resident that it did not have current access to the scheme.
The email also indicates that the resident was given some information about mutual exchange. As we have not been provided with a copy of the information she was given, it is not possible to determine if she was given sufficient information. While she was signposted in the direction of her housing officer, it appears, from the context of this complaint that it may have been difficult for the resident to have a clear line of communication with her housing officer at that point.
Later, in the stage 1 August 2022 complaint response to the resident, the landlord informed the resident that applications for mutual exchange were dealt with on a case by case basis. This information was provided over a year after the request was made but we do not consider the provision of this information at a late stage was a serious disadvantage to the resident. She would have been able to access information on the Landlord’s website about mutual exchange and it was always open to her to attempt to progress an application in any event.
Confusingly, the landlord offered the resident £50 for its failure to approve her Housing Moves application in time. If the landlord was not a member of that scheme, it does not appear the offer of payment for failing to progress an application was necessary. We do not consider there was maladministration in this regard but have more to say on this point under the section on complaint handling.

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about a leak under her kitchen sink.

The resident said she first complained about a leak in August 2021. The repair log does not provide any details about a report of a leak or about a repair. However, the evidence the landlord has provided shows the resident enquired about when the landlord would repair the leak under her sink on 11 October 2021. In that email she asked for a plumber to fix the leak under her sink and said that “…its been a while now and the kitchen cupboard is swelling”. We have addressed the landlord’s knowledge and information management further below.
In any event, even if we accepted that the first date the leak was reported was 11 October 2021, it is inappropriate that it was not reported as being repaired until 30 December 2021. The landlord’s repairs policy says that it will respond to routine repairs in 28 calendar days. Even if the only report it received was in October 2021, it took 80 days to repair the leak. This is 52 days longer than it should have taken according to its policy and is an inappropriate delay.
Further, it does not appear that the leak was fixed satisfactorily. In July 2022, following intervention from the Ombudsman, the landlord had to arrange another appointment for an operative to fix a leak under the kitchen sink. This was, according to the resident, attended to in August 2022 but by September 2022, the leak was back again. The resident said that if the landlord kept proper records, it would see that this issue had been recurring for 4 years. The repair record we have been given does not refer to any reports of a leak, including the repair that we know was raised in October 2021 and completed in December 2021. The evidence suggests the leak was a recurring issue and that no proper investigation had taken place to explain why this was the case and what could be done to permanently remedy the issue. In August 2022 the resident explained that she had spent 14 months changing pans daily. She had previously reported having to leave cleaning items all over the kitchen as she was unable to use her kitchen cupboard.
In the landlord’s stage 1 response in August 2022, it asked the resident to “…let it know” if the next appointment had resolved the issue. After having waited for such a long period of time for the landlord to attend to the issue, it would have been reasonable and demonstrated a resolution focused approach for the landlord to have arranged a post-inspection; not left it to the resident to update it on her repair issues. This is especially because the resident had expressed, in earlier correspondence, that she had so little faith in the landlord responding to her concerns, that she had, in one case, conducted the repair of a door handle herself.
In these circumstances, the landlord’s offer of £50 to acknowledge the delay in repairing the leak under the kitchen sink, was not proportionate to the distress and inconvenience incurred by the resident as a result of the landlord’s failings in its response to her reports of the leak. We have made an order recommending a payment that we consider better reflects the distress and inconvenience caused by the landlord’s maladministration.

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about an issue with her guttering.

The records indicate the resident complained about her guttering from at least July 2021. She said she had reported the issue in June 2021. She again reported it in October 2021. It is not clear from the records when this issue was attended to. It is not referred to as being a repair on the repairs log we have been provided with, which only refers to one repair in relation to the lift at the property.
However, it is clear that the guttering was not repaired within 28 working days. That is because it was not attended to between at least July 2021 and 11 October 2021. At that point the resident reported that because of the guttering issue, “…water is working its way into my flat now.” She described paint peeling and a “worrying damp circle” on the ceiling above where she slept.
The available records do not show when the guttering was attended to. We only know that it was attended to because the resident informed the landlord an operative had attended to fix it at some point before August 2022 and that he had used a gift from her late mother to prop the guttering up and glue it together. In its stage 1 response the landlord was sympathetic and expressed regret that the repair had been attended to in that way. However, given that the resident had described what appeared to be a very substandard example of repair work, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have investigated further and arranged a post-inspection. Instead, it again offered a £50 payment, which was not proportionate redress. The resident remained understandably concerned about the guttering issue and the landlord had not addressed this. We consider the landlord’s approach to amount to maladministration in this regard.

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about a back door which was in disrepair.

The records show that the resident reported this issue in July 2021. A housing officer asked her to send pictures so that a repair could be raised. The landlord’s repair records do not say when the repair went ahead but the resident complained in August 2022 about the quality of the work and behaviour of the operative. Again, the landlord apologised but, given the description of the poor quality workmanship, it would have been reasonable for the landlord to have arranged a post-inspection. We consider the landlord’s approach, in relation to the delay and the lack of a response to reports of poor workmanship to represent maladministration.

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about the contractors used.

As indicated above, the resident reported that the contractors that attended to complete the leak did not properly resolve the problem. She reported issues with the contractors that attended to address the issue with the property’s back door and the property’s guttering. In its complaint response, the landlord said it would review this feedback and use it in the future. It would have been reasonable for it to take a more proactive approach by conducting a post-inspection of the works carried out by the contractors. This would have properly addressed any issues with the work undertaken and it could have arranged to remedy any poor workmanship. It failed to do this, which indicates a failure to properly learn from outcomes and we have made a finding of maladministration.

On the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about lift repairs.

The landlord says that throughout the period concerned there was only 1 lift repair, which was completed on the same day. The resident says that sometimes the lift was out of order for weeks at a time. The landlord’s records only show 1 repair and so there is no evidence of maladministration in that regard. However, as we assess below, we have concerns about the landlord’s record keeping.

On the landlord’s complaint handling, including the level of service and communication.

The landlord’s complaints policy says it will acknowledge a stage 1 complaint within 3 days and respond to the complaint in 10 working days. The landlord did not acknowledge the resident’s stage 1 complaint and took 209 working days to provide the resident with a stage 1 response. The landlord said the resident’s original complaint was not logged by a former member of staff. However, the resident said she continued to call and email and received no response. In its stage 1 response the landlord said it had no record of her original complaint. It has since provided this to the Ombudsman. However, it could have taken the resident up on her offer on 23 July 2022, to find copies of her correspondence with the landlord. Rather than do so, it proceeded as if the resident had only just made a complaint, which must have been very frustrating.
Further, the landlord’s attempt to explain away its failure to log or respond to the resident’s original complaint because it said an officer failed to process it, does not detract from its generally poor approach to responding to the resident’s complaint. The landlord also repeatedly failed to respond to the Ombudsman’s enquiries about the resident’s complaint, to the point where we took steps to issue it with a CHFO. Ultimately, it took 199 working days longer than it should have taken under its policy. It was an inappropriate delay.
Before we issued the CHFO, the landlord wrote to the Ombudsman, on 20 July 2022, and apologised for the delay. It said that it had been in contact with the resident and that the “…leak [was] in hand”. But the appointment to fix the leak had only been made on that day. The information it provided the resident about mutual exchange on that day was also very basic, setting out what a mutual exchange was, but not answering the resident’s specific query. It did not represent a stage 1 complaint response, which was not forthcoming for a further month. This is inappropriate. Understandably the resident lost faith in the landlord’s commitment to respond to her complaints. It failed to acknowledge her escalation to stage 2 in line with its policy, being 5 days late. This further delay was inappropriate but especially so given the already poor history of responding to the resident’s concerns.
The landlord did not provide a stage 2 response to the complaint. It said this was because the resident did not wish to engage with it. However, the resident had been clear about her dissatisfaction with the landlord’s stage 1 response. It could have responded without further engagement from the resident and chose not to. This shows a lack of willingness to learn from mistakes and improve relations with the resident, which is a further inappropriate approach to the complaints process.
At stage 1 the landlord offered a total of £175 to compensate for the issues raised and the delays, as well as the stress and inconvenience caused to the resident. The Code says landlords should consider the length of time a situation has been ongoing, the frequency with which something has occurred, the severity of service failure, the number of different failures and the cumulative impact on a resident. Given that in this situation, the resident was faced with ongoing issues for a period of over 14 months, that she was met with either no response or allegedly sub-standard repairs to concerns and that by the end of the process, she had seemingly lost total faith in the landlord to put things right for her, the sum offered was not proportionate to the level of distress and inconvenience involved. We have made an order for payment that is more proportionate to the situation.
In line with section 4.4 of the Code, landlords should try and resolve complaints as quickly as possible. In this case, the landlord’s delayed response and failure to offer a suitable remedy is maladministration.
The landlord’s communication with the resident throughout the process was poor. When the resident asked about whether it had a policy on response times to enquiries, she was told, after waiting some time, that officers would respond when they were able. It is not reasonable for the landlord to have open-ended waiting times for a response. Sometimes officers might not be able to respond as quickly as they might like but it would be reasonable to be able to give residents some expectation about when they might be able to expect a response to queries.
We also note the confusing response to the resident’s complaint about not being able to make a Housing Moves application. As noted above, the landlord has provided differing responses. This indicates a failure, certainly at stage 1 of its process, to properly investigate the resident’s concerns. If it had done so at that point, it would have been able to tell the resident what it later told the Ombudsman; that it had not registered with the Housing Moves scheme. To offer the resident a payment and admit a failing for something it was not at fault for does not indicate a robust and considered approach to complaint handling.
Taken altogether, we find the landlords approach to complaint handling and to communication with the resident, was poor enough to warrant a finding of severe maladministration.

On the landlord’s information and record keeping.

This investigation has highlighted issues with the landlord’s record keeping. These will have had a resulting impact on the landlord’s ability to ensure that repairs were completed to an appropriate standard and represented a missed opportunity to fully review the history of the case when investigating the resident’s complaint. The Ombudsman therefore considers it is appropriate to make a separate finding about the landlord’s record keeping in this case.
The landlord’s record keeping was poor. The Ombudsman’s spotlight report on complaints about repairs, published in March 2019, states that ‘it is vital landlords keep clear, accurate and easily accessible records to provide an audit trail. The landlord and its contractors should keep comprehensive records of residents’ reports of outstanding repairs and their responses, including details of appointments, any pre and post-inspections, surveyors’ reports, work carried out and completion dates’.
In addition, the Ombudsman’s May 2023 Spotlight report on Knowledge and Information Management states that, “the failings to create and record information accurately results in landlords not taking appropriate and timely action, missing opportunities to identify that actions were wrong or inadequate, and contributing to inadequate communication and redress”. The landlord’s records give little indication of which works were carried out, when they were completed or if they took place at all. The lack of clear and accurate record keeping would have contributed to the lack of updates to the resident, the failure to meet agreed timescales and the protracted delays in resolving the outstanding issues. The Ombudsman has taken this into account when reaching the overall finding that there was maladministration in this case.

Determination (decision)

In accordance with paragraph 42 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration in the landlord’s response to
1. the resident’s concerns about her Housing Moves application including queries about a mutual exchange.
2. The resident’s concerns about lift repairs.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of:
1. a leak under the kitchen sink.
2. an issue with the guttering.
3. a back door which was in disrepair.
4. concerns about contractors used by the landlord for repairs.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was severe maladministration in the landlord’s complaint handling, including the level of service and communication.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s knowledge and information management.

Reasons

The landlord says it was not a member of the Housing Moves scheme at the time the resident said she made an application. The evidence suggests she was told it did not have access to the scheme. Even if the resident did not receive a response to a specific query about mutual exchange policy, this did not prevent her from accessing information on the landlord’s’ website and making applications to exchange in the meantime.
The landlord has provided records which show only 1 report of a required lift repair, and this is recorded as being completed on the same day. There is therefore no evidence of maladministration in that regard.
The landlord delayed responding to the resident’s report of a leak under the kitchen sink. This leak reoccurred but we have not seen any evidence of a plan to post inspect to resolve the issue.
The landlord delayed responding to the resident’s report of an issue with her guttering. When attended to the resident reported substandard workmanship and damage to her personal possessions. The resident’s reasonable concerns about the way the guttering repair was conducted remained, but the landlord did not offer to post-inspect, leaving her anxious about the situation.
The landlord delayed in repairing the back door at the property. When it did attend the repair, the resident reported substandard workmanship and the landlord failed to offer a post-inspection.
The landlord acknowledged the resident’s concerns about contractor behaviour but did not take any steps to examine the repair work that had been carried out.
The landlord failed to respond to the resident’s initial complaint and to the Ombudsman’s chasing enquiries about that complaint, resulting in a Complaints Handling Failure Order being issued. Further, it failed to sufficiently consider an appropriate remedy to acknowledge the failings in its approach over a protracted period of time.
The landlord’s records of repairs and of the resident’s complaint communications with it were minimal. This prevented a coordinated and helpful response to both her complaints and repairs.

Orders and recommendations

Within 4 weeks a senior member of the landlord’s staff should apologise to the resident, in person if the resident prefers. The apology should acknowledge the landlord’s failings, accept responsibility for them, explain clearly why they happened, and express regret.
Within 4 weeks of the date of this report the landlord is to pay the resident the total of £1700, consisting of:
1. £500 to acknowledge the distress and inconvenience caused by its delayed response to the resident’s report about a leak under the kitchen sink and its failure to remedy this effectively over time, with the leak reoccurring repeatedly.
2. £300 to acknowledge the delayed response to the issues the resident raised about the guttering and the landlord’s failure to post-inspect the work.
3. £100 to acknowledge the delayed response to the issues raised about the back door and the landlord’s failure to post-inspect the work.
4. £500 to acknowledge the landlord’s poor complaint handling as identified in this report.
5. £300 to acknowledge the difficulties caused by the landlord’s poor knowledge and information management as identified in this report.
If the landlord has already paid the resident the £175 previously offered, this should be deducted from the £1700 ordered. The payment is to be made direct to the resident and not used to offset any monies that the resident may owe to the landlord. The landlord must update this Service when payment has been made.
Within 4 weeks of this report the landlord must also visit the property and conduct a post-inspection on all the works completed since July 2021. It must complete an inspection of the property to establish if there are any outstanding issues and if so, within a further 2 weeks provide the resident and this Service with a timetable of when the works will be carried out.
Within 8 weeks of this report, the landlord must undertake a senior management review of the case to help prevent failures reoccurring. The review should include, but not be limited to, consideration of 2 specific issues of concern:
1. Its failings in record keeping in this case and how it can improve its systems. It should consider how it can implement the recommendations set out in the Ombudsman’s May 2023 Spotlight report on Knowledge and Information Management (KIM).
2. Its approach to complaint handling, focusing on the excessive delays identified in this report and also the failure to provide proportionate remedies for failings found.
The outcome of this review, along with an action plan setting out how the landlord intends to implement any findings or considerations made, is to be reported to both this Service and the landlord’s governing body. The senior managers carrying out the review must have had no previous involvement with this case.