Spitalfields Housing Association Limited (202008574)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202008574

Spitalfields Housing Association Limited

14 February 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 the landlords:
    1. Handling of the resident’s request to purchase her property.
    2. Complaint handling.

Background and summary of events

  1. The resident moved into the property in 1996. She is an assured tenant of the landlord who is a housing association.
  2. The resident raised a complaint on 19 November 2019. She said in 1998 she applied to purchase her property through a Voluntary Purchase Grant (VPG), but it was declined. She said her property was valued in 2002, but she was unable to purchase it as the landlord had not obtained the VPG. She asked the landlord to offer her the property at the price valued in 1998 (with the equivalent discount of the VPG), or 2002 “with the current level of discounts available to social tenants”. The landlord asked her to provide documentation to support her complaint. In its final complaint response, the landlord said as the resident had an assured tenancy, she did not qualify for the right to buy (RTB). It said as the property was built before 1997, it would not be considered for the right to acquire (RTA). It said the VPG was no longer available to residents. 
  3. The resident referred her complaint to this Service in November 2020 and asked for our assistance in confirming whether she had exhausted the landlord’s complaints procedure. We contacted the landlord on three occasions. It responded in May 2021. The resident remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s delay and asked us to investigate its handling of her request to purchase her property. 

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. In her complaint, the resident expressed her dissatisfaction with not being able to purchase her property in 1998 or 2002 due to not obtaining the VPG. The Ombudsman requires complaints to be raised formally with a landlord within a reasonable period from when the issues complained about arose. Paragraph 39(e) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme sets out that a reasonable period is usually six months. Given the amount of time between the original issues and the formal complaint, this investigation will centre on the landlord’s response to the resident’s complaint in 2019, rather than its handling of any other historical issues which occurred prior to 2019.

Request to purchase the property

  1. The RTB and RTA schemes allow residents to purchase their property at discounted prices. However, there are certain criteria that must be met as not all residents and properties are eligible. For example, to qualify for the RTB, residents must be secure tenants. They may also be eligible for a preserved RTB if they were previously secure council tenants, and their home was transferred to a housing association whilst they were living there. Assured, or secure tenants can qualify for the RTA. However, the property needs to have been built, or bought by a housing association after 31 March 1997, or transferred from a local council to a housing association after 31 March 1997. The resident’s tenancy agreement does not set out that she has the RTB or RTA.
  2. In the resident’s complaint, she asked the landlord to offer her the property at its price from 1998 with the discount she would have obtained from the VPG, or at the price from 2002 with the current level of discounts available. The landlord said the resident had no RTB or RTA. The resident is an assured tenant, and her tenancy began in 1996. There is no evidence to indicate she was previously a secure council tenant. As such, the landlord’s explanations as to why she would not qualify for the RTA or RTB were correct as she did not meet the criteria (as explained above) for either scheme. The landlord therefore managed the resident’s expectations and gave appropriate information as to why she could not purchase her property.
  3. The landlord also explained to the resident that the VPG was no longer available. The landlord’s records show the VPG was discretionary grant available to assured tenants “with the purpose of buying in the open market and giving up their social housing property”. The grant was abolished many years ago (it is unclear when exactly). As such, the landlord’s decision not to consider the VPG was reasonable as it would not be expected to offer a grant that was unavailable.
  4. Ultimately, there are no reasonable grounds on which the landlord would be expected to allow the resident to purchase the property as her tenancy agreement does not allow it, she is not eligible for either the RTA or RTB, and the VPG is no longer available. Therefore, the landlord’s response to the resident was reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint.

Complaint handling

  1. The landlord’s complaints policy says it has a two-stage complaint procedure. It will respond to stage one complaints within ten working days, and stage two complaints within 20 working days. The policy also states that the landlord will close a case after 14 days if it receives no response from the complainant.
  2. The landlord acknowledged the resident’s complaint on 26 November 2019 by asking her to provide further information. There is no evidence that the resident responded to the landlord’s request, or that she chased it on the issue until March 2020. This was considerably beyond the 14-month timeframe, thus, there was no failure in the landlord not providing a complaint response sooner than it did.
  3. This Service recognises that landlords may reasonably decide to conclude the complaints process after a singular response where the subject matter and facts of the case strongly indicate that there would be no merit in further prolonging the complaints process. The decision to provide a singular response in this case was reasonable as the facts clearly show that the property does not meet the criteria to be purchased by the resident and an external review of the matter would be more beneficial. However, there were other significant failings in the landlord’s complains handling.
  4. Firstly, the singular stage two decision did not include any information on the status of the case and whether the resident could seek external escalation at the time. This Service contacted the landlord on three occasions over the course of seven months, asking for its confirmation on its final position regarding the resident’s complaint. The landlord delayed unreasonably in responding. This in turn, caused an unreasonable delay in the resident being able to bring her complaint forward for an investigation. The landlord has an obligation as a member of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme to provide responses and clarifications on complaints, in a timely manner, in order to assist with investigations by the Ombudsman. These failings constitute a failure in complaint handling by the landlord.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration in respect of the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request to purchase her property.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in respect of the landlord’s complaint handling.

Reasons

  1. The landlord’s explanations as to why the resident was not eligible to purchase her property were appropriate. However, its complaint handling was poor. It  delayed unreasonably in its communication with the resident, and this Service.

Orders

  1. The landlord is ordered to pay the resident £100 for the inconvenience and delay experienced as a result of the service failure identified with the landlord’s complaint handling.
  2. This payment should be made within four weeks of the date of this report. The landlord should update this Service when the payment has been made.

Recommendation

  1. The landlord should seriously consider sharing the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code with its staff members who deal with complaints in order to ensure that complaints are responded to in line with best practice and they are aware of their obligations.