Great Places Housing Association (202118432)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202118432

Great Places Housing Association

28 January 2022

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:
   1. The landlord’s response to the activation of the resident’s carbon monoxide alarm.
   2. The landlord’s handlining of the resident’s complaint

Background and summary of events

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord.
3. No specific records from the time of the resident’s report about the alarm have been provided by the landlord. Because of that, many of the details below have been taken from the resident’s complaint to the landlord about the matter. There appears to be no dispute about the events leading up to the complaint.
4. The resident’s complaint email of 29 October 2020 recalls that on the evening of 20 October 2020 she contacted the landlord as her carbon monoxide alarm had activated. The landlord transferred the call to the gas emergency service. They sent an engineer out. He did not find any gas leak, but turned off the gas to the property and advised the resident to call the landlord. As it was out of hours when the resident rang the landlord she was advised to call back the next day.
5. The resident called the landlord the following morning who arranged with its contractor to send out a gas engineer. He arrived at 3pm. At approximately 4.30pm the resident left the property but advised the engineer to update her older son, who was upstairs, if he finished before she returned. The resident has explained that when she returned at approximately 4.40pm her door was open and the engineer had left. There was a yellow warning sticker on her cooker saying it should not be used, and a letter explaining the same. The carbon monoxide alarm was left disconnected. She called the repairs contractor to make a complaint. She was advised they would call her back the next day. 
6. The resident’s complaint email states that she called the landlord on 22 October 2020 as she had had not received the promised call. She said she had been told that the landlord would pass the complaint to its repairs contractor. She said she had contacted the cooker manufacturer, as well as the gas engineer who had originally fitted the cooker. She said the engineer told her it would be very unusual for the cooker to be leaking carbon monoxide, as the oven was electric and only the hob was gas.
7. Following her enquiries of the installer and the manufacturer the resident called the landlord to request it give a second opinion about the cooker. She was concerned that the engineer may have been rushing and that there may be nothing wrong with it. She has explained that she was told she would receive a call the following day.
8. The repairs contractor called the resident on 26 October 2020 to advise her a gas engineer would be visiting the next day. The gas engineer called her during the visit on 27 October 2020 to confirm that there was no carbon monoxide leaking from the cooker and that he had turned it back on.
9. The landlord’s records show that the gas engineer had checked the boiler and the cooker and that all safety tests were passed. It noted that the alarm activation may have been down to a faulty carbon monoxide detector.
10. The resident emailed her complaint to the landlord on 29 October 2020. She sought an apology and compensation for the stress and inconvenience of her “perfectly working cooker” being turned off for a week and having to buy take away food for the family during that time.
11. The landlord’s records show that it replied to the email on 3 November 2020, thanking the resident for her email and advising that it had been sent to the relevant officer who would contact her “shortly”. Between that date and 9 March 2021 the resident chased for updates about the complaint several times and was advised that it was being dealt with. On 9 March 2021 she told the landlord that it had been six months and she had still not received a response to her complaint and she mentioned for the first time that her carbon monoxide detector had still not been replaced. The landlord replied that it hoped to have a full update by the following week.
12. The landlord’s repairs records show that a carbon monoxide detector was installed on 16 March 2021.
13. The resident continued to email the landlord for a response to her complaint. Internal emails confirm that the details of the complaint were passed internally to the complaints team on 4 August 2021, and the complaints team emailed the resident on 20 August 2021 to confirm whether she wanted to raise a formal complaint. The resident replied that day confirming that she did want to raise a complaint and that it had been nearly a year since she sent the original complaint.
14. On 25 August 2021 the complaints team emailed the resident an official acknowledgment of her complaint.
15. In its stage one response, issued 1 September 2021, the landlord apologised that the resident had not received the agreed call-backs from the repairs contractor after she reported that her door had been left open. It offered £20 compensation for the inconvenience, and had spoken to the contractor to remind them of the importance of calling customers back promptly. It confirmed that the gas engineer who attended on 21 October 2020 had found high levels of carbon monoxide emitted from the cooker. He acted in line with the requirements of the GIUSP’s (Gas Industry Unsafe Situations Procedures) when he disconnected the gas cooker and issued the Warning Notice.
16. The landlord explained that the engineer had explained he arrived at the resident’s home at around 3pm and as the resident and her husband had both left when the work was completed he had informed the resident’s son (as requested by the resident) that he had completed the work and was leaving. The resident’s son was upstairs at that point and the engineer advised that he let himself out and shut the door behind him. It stated that on the second visit on 27 October 2021 an engineer carried out a full sweep test in-line with the requirements of BS 7967. The result of this test identified that the appliance was safe to use, and the gas cooker was left operational.
17. The landlord acknowledged that the resident had been unable to use the cooker between 21 and 27 October but explained that as a landlord it is regulated under the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998, which means that when a gas safe engineer attends a property and identifies high readings of carbon monoxide, it is their duty to isolate and/or disconnect the cause as a precaution for the resident’s safety. Therefore the engineer who attended on 21 October 2021 had acted within regulations and followed the correct procedure.
18. The landlord’s records show that the resident escalated the complaint to stage two on 1 September 2021. She disputed that the engineer had spoken to her son, and said again that the door was fully open. She said the second visit was only arranged after she requested a second opinion, and that she was originally told that would not be possible. She said that the second visit was only agreed after her numerous calls. She stated that she believed the engineer who condemned the cooker had been side-tracked and just wanted to leave the job. She also complained that it had taken nearly a year to look into her complaint, and that she had been left without a carbon monoxide alarm for most of that time. She wanted compensation of two month’s rent for the inconvenience, stress and “the danger of not having an alarm up” and that she would be contacting her solicitor. 
19. On 4 October 2021 the landlord issued its stage two response. It explained that the attending engineer on 21st October 2020 recorded that there were high CO readings in the area of the cooker and disconnected it. In the circumstances, the engineer had acted correctly. As the resident owned the cooker she was responsible for arranging any further inspection, not the landlord. It reiterated the engineers explanation of how he left the property. It explained that although it did not have a responsibility to do so, it had agreed to send another engineer on 27 October 2021 in response to the resident’s request for a second opinion. As no high levels of carbon monoxide were recorded on this date, the cooker was reconnected.
20. The landlord explained that it did not have a responsibility to install a carbon monoxide alarm, and, although there was one at the property at the time of the incident, it was not known who had installed it. Nonetheless, it had agreed to install a carbon monoxide detector in March 2021. The landlord concluded by reaffirming that its engineer had acted correctly, and re-offered its initial £20 compensation for its complaint delays, and explained how the resident could approach the Ombudsman if she remained dissatisfied. The resident was dissatisfied with the landlord’s response as she believed that the first gas engineer should not have disconnected the cooker, which left her with no cooking facilities and having to rely on takeaways for the period that it was disconnected. She also believed that the landlord acted illegally by not ensuring that there was a carbon monoxide detector at the property.

Assessment and findings

21. The landlord’s website states that “when conducting a gas installation safety check the whole of the gas installation, including all appliances, whether provided by Great Places or a customer’s own appliance, will be checked for safety. When assessing an unsafe gas appliance, all engineers will follow the Gas Industry Unsafe Situations Procedure (GIUSP), which provides ‘best practice’ advice to engineers on how to deal with specific gas safety concerns. …In a customer’s appliance this will be a visual inspection only to comply with regulatory standards. Should the engineer consider that there is a safety defect then the guidance of the unsafe situations procedure will be followed, normally this would be a request to stop using the appliance until it can be repaired. We will not be held responsible for any repairs, replacement or re-connection of the appliance.”
22. Unlike private landlords, social landlords (such as Great Places Housing Group) have until recently not had a legal obligation to install carbon monoxide detectors. In November 2021 the regulations were amended so that social landlords were brought in line with private landlords and obliged to install (and maintain) carbon monoxide detectors in rooms with certain types of appliance, such as a gas boiler.
23. Following the resident’s report of her carbon monoxide detector activating, the landlord promptly arranged for an engineer to attend that same day. The gas had already been turned off and made safe the previous night by an emergency out of hours service. The landlord’s engineer completed an inspection, concluded that there was a potential problem with the cooker, and acted accordingly to place on it a warning not to use it. The engineer acted in line with the landlord’s gas safety procedures in doing so, and there is no evidence indicating that the landlord was unreasonable in accepting the engineer’s professional opinion during or following the inspection.
24. The resident made enquiries of the cooker manufacturer and the original installer, neither of whom, she explained, gave her reason to think there should be a problem with the cooker. However, neither party inspected the property or the cooker, so their advice can only be considered general in nature, and not specific to the incident in question. Their advice does not undermine the engineer’s findings or decisions, which were based on his inspection.
25. The landlord conducted a second inspection one week later, and found nothing of concern. An inspection of a gas leak one week later with different results is not enough, on its own, to be considered evidence of failings in the original inspection.
26. It stands to reason that as the resident owned the cooker, it was her responsibility to ensure its repair and maintenance. The landlord was not obliged to arrange the second visit, because no new repairs had been reported. It used its discretion to do so.
27. The landlord correctly explained in its complaint responses that it did not have an obligation to provide, install or replace the resident’s carbon monoxide detector. Its explanation was in line with the regulations at the time.
28. Both the resident and the engineer provided differing accounts of what happened when the engineer left the property. No evidence has been provided which supports one account over the other. The landlord acted appropriately when it investigated the issue and sought the engineer’s account from the contractors. Its approach and conclusions were reasonable in the circumstances of there being no independent witnesses or other evidence.
29. In its complaint response the landlord explained in detail the actions the engineer had taken, and why. It clearly explained why it believed the engineer had acted correctly. Nothing in the evidence provided for this investigation suggests the landlord’s view was unreasonable, or that the engineer acted incorrectly.

Complaints handling

30. While the explanations and details in the landlord’s complaint responses were clear and detailed, the time taken to respond to the complaint was wholly unreasonable. The landlord acknowledged receipt of the resident’s complaint email on 3 November 2020, but it did not formally acknowledge it as a complaint until 25 August 2021. A period of approximately ten months, during which the resident sought a response on multiple occasions. This is unreasonable as the delay was significantly outside of the landlord’s complaint timeframes, and the resident should not have needed to chase a response. 
31. The landlord’s current complaints policy states that it will respond to a stage one complaint within 10 working days, and to a stage two complaint within 20 working days. The complaints policy changed during the ten month delay, and we have not been provided with the complaints policy that was in effect when the resident made her complaint. Nonetheless, a ten month delay is unacceptable by any standards.

Determination (decision)

32. In accordance with paragraph 54 of The Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was no maladministration by the landlord in respect of its response to the activation of the resident’s carbon monoxide alarm.
33. In accordance with paragraph 54 of The Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was service failure by the landlord in respect of its handling of the resident’s complaint.

Reasons

34. The landlord acted reasonably in its response to the carbon monoxide alarm and explained its actions clearly in its complaint responses.
35. It took the landlord approximately ten months to acknowledge and raise a formal complaint which was unacceptable by any standards.

Orders

36. In light of the extensive delay in responding to the resident’s complaint, and the inconvenience she was put to in chasing the matter, the landlord is to pay the resident £100 compensation.
37. This payment is in addition to the £20 it offered previously, which should now also be paid, if has not already been.
38. This total payment of £120 must be made within four weeks of this report.