Clarion Housing Association Limited (202102780)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202102780

Clarion Housing Association Limited

30 March 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 landlord’s handling of:
   1. The resident’s concerns about the communal window cleaning service.
   2. The resident’s concerns about its lack of communal cleaning services and its administration of her service charges for these.

Jurisdiction

2. What we can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. This is governed by 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.
3. After carefully considering all the evidence, in accordance with paragraph 39(a) of the Scheme, the following aspect of the complaint is outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction:
   1. The resident’s concerns about the communal window cleaning service.
4. It is noted that the resident has expressed dissatisfaction with the landlord’s lack of communal window cleaning and its administration of her service charges for these since 20 July 2021.
5. Paragraph 39(a) of the Scheme states that the Ombudsman will not investigate complaints which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion: “are made prior to having exhausted a member’s complaints procedure”.
6. Nevertheless, the landlord’s final stage complaint response to the resident of 20 July 2021 only responded to her concerns about its communal cleaning services and service charges other than for windows, and there is no evidence that the latter has otherwise exhausted its complaints procedure yet. Therefore, a determination will not be made on the aspect of her complaint regarding its handling of her concerns about the communal window cleaning service, as the landlord must first be given the opportunity to fully respond to these concerns under its complaints procedure.
7. The resident’s complaint about the landlord’s handling of her concerns about its lack of communal cleaning services and its administration of her service charges for these, however, is within this Services jurisdiction to investigate and has been considered below.

Background

8. The resident is a shared ownership leaseholder of a property in a block of flats, and the landlord is her freeholder.
9. The resident raised a stage one complaint with the landlord on 6 March 2021 about the communal cleaning in her block, which she reported had not been provided as there had been no attendance by cleaners. She explained that she was still being charged by it for a service that had not been provided. The resident added that she had first raised the issue on 22 February 2021, but the landlord had not responded to this within ten days as per its complaints policy .
10. The landlord emailed an acknowledgement to the resident’s stage one complaint on 9 March 2021 and advised her that she would be contacted within ten working days. On 18 March 2021, she emailed the landlord and explained that she had not received a response to her complaint. The resident requested a clear breakdown of management fees and administrative costs being charged to her by the landlord, as she had not received a cleaning service, which she continued to request from it together with a response to her complaint on 30 to 31 March, 5 to 11 April and 2 to 11 May 2021.
11. The landlord’s internal emails showed that it contacted its contractor on 14 May 2021 regarding the communal cleaning services, and the contractor confirmed that they had attended to clean the resident’s block on 9 March 2021. It was further confirmed by the contractor that cleaners would re-attend the block that week to carry out cleaning. The contractor did not, however, provide the dates when they would re–attend to carry out the cleaning.
12. The landlord emailed a stage one complaint response to the resident on 1 June 2021, and it explained that the contractor confirmed that they had been attending to clean her block every week since 9 March 2021 and had not been informed of any recent issues with the cleaning there. It also stated that, although she reported having not previously received a response from it about this, its staff had confirmed that they had emailed her on 25 February 2021 to acknowledge the concerns she raised on 22 February 2021, and that these had been passed on to the contractor at the time. The resident was offered £100 to compensate her for the delays in responding to her complaint and for an administrative error in relation to her service charges.
13. The resident then emailed the landlord again on 6 June 2021 to reiterate that its cleaning contractors had failed to fulfil basic duties or to attend at all at times from 19 October 2020 to 11 May 2021 at her block, of which she had photographs. As she therefore disputed its service charges to her for its cleaning costs, she requested that these be refunded to her, as well as querying its compensation offer to her and administration costs, given its reported lack of responses, communication and property management. The landlord subsequently acknowledged the resident’s email as a final stage complaint on 30 June 2021 and made internal enquiries about this from 8 to 9 July 2021.
14. To fully resolve the resident’s concerns, the landlord emailed a final stage complaint response to the resident on 20 July 2021, and it explained that her cleaning service charges had been adjusted and account credited with £67.53. It said that this was because, although its cleaning contractors’ attendances were evidenced by their weekly sign-in sheets, it could not evidence these for 15 February to 8 March 2021, for which it had refunded her, was holding monthly meetings with its contractor that would photograph their completed cleaning. The landlord added that it would ask the contractor to re-attend and address any concerns from residents or its estate inspections, for which it would withhold payment and refund residents if this was not done by the following month.
15. The landlord also apologised for its poor communication with the resident, but it explained that it could not refund the management and administration fees that were a requirement of her lease agreement. It additionally acknowledged its delays in response to her stage one and final stage complaints. The resident was awarded an additional £350 compensation by the landlord. It explained that this was for a repair delay, failure to meet service standards for actions and responses, its delayed final stage complaint response, and as recognition of her time and efforts chasing responses.
16. The resident referred her complaint to this Service, as she was dissatisfied with the landlord’s handling of the communal cleaning and the administration of the service charge. Additionally, she complained about the standard of the cleaning service provided by it, and that there were outstanding issues regarding this, which she had brought to its attention.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s concerns about its lack of communal cleaning services and its administration of service charge for these

17. In line with the terms of the resident’s lease agreement, the landlord is responsible for the cleaning and maintaining of the communal areas of her block. It demonstrated that it did not fully comply with its obligations to do so, when its contractors failed to attend as shown in the contractor’s sign–in sheets referred to by it in its internal emails. This was following the landlord’s internal investigation, which showed that the contractor had not evidenced that they had attended to clean the block from 15 February to 8 March 2021.
18. This was inappropriate, as the landlord confirmed that it had not complied with its obligation to clean the communal areas of the resident’s block via its cleaning contractor during the above period. It also did not provide evidence to show that it had carried out site inspections, or that it had made other monitoring arrangements at that time, to ensure that the contractor was providing the cleaning service as part of the maintenance of the site.
19. The landlord acknowledged in its stage one complaint response to the resident that it did not previously carry out any site inspections of the communal cleaning in the resident’s block due to the pandemic. However, while it is reasonable to expect some delays to the contractor carrying out the cleaning services and the landlord’s inspections of these due to the pandemic, there were no other alternative monitoring arrangements put in place by it in February to March 2021 to ensure that it complied with its cleaning obligations.
20. It is also concerning that the landlord did not prioritise the resident’s concerns about communal cleaning after it contacted her about this on 12 March 2021, following her stage one complaint to it on 6 March 2021. It instead two months to contact its contractor to find out when the site was last attended for communal cleaning, in its email of 14 May 2021.
21. Although the landlord’s repairs and maintenance policy does not specify the timeframe within which communal cleaning should take place, it is expected that this should be weekly, as confirmed by its reference to the weekly sign–in sheets that were signed by the contractor. It is, therefore, inappropriate that the landlord did not follow up to investigate the resident’s concerns within a reasonable timescale in order to put things right and resolve the issue. Although it was unable to independently verify that the contractor failed to attend other than from 15 February to 8 March 2021, and so it was not required to compensate for her reports of their non-attendances on other dates.
22. Regarding the landlord’s communication with the resident, there were significant delays in it responding to her after she raised her concerns about the communal cleaning. It responded to her stage one complaint after almost three months on 1 June 2021, which was contrary to its complaints policy stating that such a response should be within ten working days. This was inappropriate as the resident had to wait for an unreasonable period to be informed by the landlord as to how her concerns would be resolved. She had a legitimate expectation that her stage one complaint would be responded to in accordance with its complaints policy, for which she repeatedly had to chase it.
23. Nevertheless, the landlord took appropriate action to put things right when it acknowledged its poor communication with the resident and explained how this had not been to the expected standard. It apologised for its shortcomings in its stage one complaint response of 1 June 2021. In its final stage complaint response to the resident of 20 July 2021, the landlord took reasonable action when it adjusted the resident’s service charge by £67.53 as it could not find evidence of the contractors attending from 15 February to 8 March 2021 in its records. In doing so, it demonstrated that it sought to put things right.
24. Furthermore, the landlord demonstrated that it was taking steps to learn from the outcome of the resident’s case as evidenced in its internal email dated 8 July 2021. This showed that there were ongoing discussions regarding how to address concerns regarding the contractor via monthly meetings, and withholding payment when services have not been provided, as well as photographing their completed cleaning. In its final stage complaint response, the landlord confirmed this and it also recognised the delayed responses, distress and inconvenience that the resident experienced when it apologised and compensated her for these.
25. With regard to the level of compensation awarded, it was appropriate that the landlord offered the resident £450 compensation to recognise its failings, as per its breakdown of this in the final stage complaint response. This is because its compensation policy gave it discretion to recognise the degree of impact, inaction or poor service experienced by the resident, as it explained in its stage one complaint response to her when it offered her £100 compensation for its delayed complaint response and service charge administration error.
26. The landlord later offered the resident an additional £350 compensation at the final stage of the complaints procedure. This was in line with the range of compensation recommended by its compensation policy for considerable failures, including causing the resident to have to repeatedly chase responses from, and experience delays and failures by it to act in accordance with policy over a considerable period of time.

Determination

27. In accordance with paragraph 55(b) of the Scheme, the landlord has offered redress to the resident prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint about its lack of communal cleaning services and its administration of her service charges for these satisfactorily.

Recommendation

28. It is recommended that the landlord re-offer the resident the £450 compensation that it previously awarded to her, if this has not already been paid to her.