Stonewater Limited (202344467)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202344467

Stonewater Limited

18 November 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 handling of the resident’s reports of anti-social behaviour (ASB).

Background

The resident is an assured tenant and he lives in a 1 bedroom flat in a block of 3 flats. The landlord is a housing association which owns and manages the block and the resident’s flat.
On 2 January 2024 the resident emailed the landlord to report that he had been racially abused and threatened by a neighbour. The landlord replied on 29 January 2024 saying it had asked the police for information. It asked if further incidents had happened. The resident replied saying that the neighbour had kicked his door and was leaving rubbish at the entrance of the block.
The resident complained on 2 February 2024. He said that it had been 4 weeks since he had reported being racially abused and the landlord had not intervened or offered any support.
The landlord gave its stage 1 complaint response on 21 February 2024 which said:
1. It was sorry for the delay in starting to investigate his allegations and offered £75 compensation for this.
2. It had been in regular contact with him from 29 January 2024 and had agreed an action plan with him.
3. It had ordered additional locks, a fire-proof letterbox and video doorbell as extra security measures.
The resident asked for his complaint to be escalated on 22 February 2024. He said that he had left his home as he did not feel safe there.
The landlord gave its stage 2 complaint response on 11 March 2024 which said:
1. It had apologised for its delay in starting its investigation and offered compensation in its stage 1 response.
2. Since then, it had followed the action plan agreed with him and had provided extra security measures.
3. It now believed that his son had “posed” as him during a call about the ASB. His son’s behaviour towards its staff member during the call had been unacceptable.
4. The resident would need to give his consent if he wanted the landlord to discuss the ASB investigation or other matters relating to his tenancy with his son.
5. It felt that the £75 compensation it had offered at stage 1 was appropriate.
The resident asked the Ombudsman to investigate. He said that he remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s handling of his ASB reports and it had not provided the extra security measures. He wanted the landlord to apologise and give compensation for his distress and inconvenience.

Assessment and findings

The resident’s allegations of racial abuse and threats to harm him were potentially criminal matters. In such cases, the police service is the appropriate organisation to investigate the criminal allegations and decide if there is evidence that the law has been broken. The landlord’s role is to support any police investigation and consider whether there are any tenancy breaches that it should act upon.
The landlord’s ASB policy says that it will investigate all reports of ASB that are hate incidents. The policy says the landlord will contact people who have reported a hate incident within 1 working day to agree an action plan.
The resident’s report of racial abuse of 2 January 2024 met the definition of a hate incident within the landlord’s policy. As such, the landlord should have arranged to speak with him as soon as possible to gather further information and agree an action plan with him.
However, the landlord did not email the resident until 29 January 2024 which was 19 working days after receiving his report. The delay was inappropriate and contrary to the timescale in the landlord’s ASB policy. Also, as the landlord had only emailed, it did not agree an action plan with the resident at this point.
Similarly, the landlord should have asked the police for further information sooner. The resident had told the landlord that he had reported the incident to the police in his initial report of 2 January 2024. The landlord did not ask the police for further information until 29 January 2024.
When the resident replied to the landlord’s email on 30 January 2024 he told the landlord of further incidents. The landlord’s response that it was waiting for a response from the police but would “try” to contact the resident within the next few days was inadequate. It was a missed opportunity to gather information and agree an action plan with the resident.
The delays meant that by the time the landlord spoke with the resident on 7 February 2024, 26 working days had passed since it had received his initial ASB report. The landlord did agree an action plan with the resident during this call which included agreeing the frequency and method of future contacts it would make. The landlord appropriately emailed the resident to confirm the agreed action plan.
The landlord then followed its agreed action plan by chasing the police for information about the resident’s reports. The landlord spoke with the police on 9 February 2024. It gained information about the reports the police had received and the action the police intended to take.
Following the information exchanged with the police, the landlord concluded that its call on 7 February 2024 had been with the resident’s son rather than the resident himself.
The landlord could have arranged to meet with the resident to discuss the information it had received. Doing so would have enabled the landlord to clarify its understanding of the ASB reports and decide whether it should take any action.
Instead, the landlord emailed the resident on 14 February 2024 confirming it had ordered extra security measures to help him feel safer. It also said that it would not communicate with his son in future as he had been rude during the call on 7 February 2024. As such, the landlord missed the opportunity to clarify its understanding of the ASB situation.
The landlord did email the police on 22 February 2024 asking if any further reports had been made and suggesting joint visits to the resident and his neighbour. This was a good way for the landlord to make sure that both organisations could get the same understanding of the situation.
The resident had emailed the landlord on 8 March 2024 giving the crime reference numbers for 9 further incidents that he had reported to the police.
The landlord and police visited both properties later on 8 March 2024. The landlord’s records showed it understood, from the discussion with the resident, that he had no issues with his neighbour except for noise. It also understood the resident had not received its emails about the ASB case or the landlord’s call with his son, and that the resident’s son sometimes contacted the landlord on his behalf but did not live with him.
From this point, it was reasonable that the landlord focussed on the resident’s concern about noise. It was also reasonable that it told the resident that it would not consider the noise to be ASB or a tenancy breach. This was in line with its ASB policy which says that it does not consider noise of children playing and “proportionate” household noise as ASB or a breach of tenancy conditions.
The landlord had later asked the neighbour to be mindful of the noise transmission. This was a proportionate response to the issues the resident had discussed with the landlord.
It was also reasonable that the landlord discussed the resident’s communication needs with him. However, the landlord’s record of the visit suggests it may have missed the opportunity to clarify whether the resident had sent the emails reporting racial abuse and threats, whether he was sleeping elsewhere and whether he had made the complaint about the landlord’s response.
After the joint visit, the landlord received another email from the resident on 17 March 2024. The email said he had been threatened with a knife and racially abused again and had reported the incident to the police. It also said that the extra security measures had not been provided.
The landlord’s response was appropriate and in line with its ASB policy. On the next working day, it had asked the police for information and replied to the resident asking if there had been witnesses. It also chased up its orders for the extra security measures.
The landlord’s records showed it later concluded that the report had been made by the resident’s son and had asked for the resident to contact it directly. This was a reasonable position for the landlord to take but it could have been proactive in making contact with the resident itself.
There were failings in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s initial ASB report. The landlord appropriately acknowledged its failings through its complaint process and offered compensation. The landlord’s records show that it paid the compensation on 6 March 2024 and the Ombudsman considers this to have been reasonable.
However, we saw no evidence that the landlord did provide the extra security measures it had said it would provide. Nor did we see evidence that the landlord had changed its position following its changed understanding of the ASB situation. While the landlord has no obligation to provide the extra security measures, its failure to clarify its position amounts to a service failure which the landlord should rectify.

Determination

In accordance with paragraph 52. of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of ASB.

Orders

Within 4 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord must provide us with evidence that it has complied with the following orders:
1. The landlord must meet with the resident face to face to gain an up to date understanding of the ASB situation and establish whether the resident has any safety concerns that the landlord can support him with. The landlord should also review the resident’s communication preferences.
2. Within 2 weeks of meeting with the resident, the landlord must write to him to confirm its understanding of the ASB and any further investigation it intends. The landlord must also clarify its position in respect of it providing the extra security measures it previously offered. The landlord must send us a copy of its letter.