Leeds City Council (202102205)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202102205

Leeds City Council

14 April 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. This complaint is about the landlord’s handling of brickwork repairs to the resident’s property.

Background and summary of events

Background

2. The landlord has advised that the resident is a secure tenant and described the property as a three-bed semi-detached house. The landlord is a local authority.
3. The landlord has advised that the resident holds a secure tenancy – this obliges it to repair and maintain ‘the structure and exterior’ of the property. It adds that the resident ‘must not make improvements, additions or structural alterations to the property without getting the council’s written permission first’.
4. The landlord has a criteria for classifying essential and non-essential repairs; this shows that it regards external repairs as non-essential unless it presents a significant hazard.
5. The landlord has a ‘repairs and maintenance handbook’ that provides timescales that it is obliged to complete repairs within. This sets out that it aims to complete ‘batched repairs’ (which require pre-inspection and time to order materials) within 60 working days. It adds that improvement works such as brickwork pointing and major repairs to walls ‘are delivered through planned programmes of work set out in the council’s annual investment plan’ and that it will keep residents ‘informed of work progress especially if the job cannot be completed in one visit’.
6. The landlord has a complaints policy that sets out a two-stage procedure. It shows that it will respond within 15 working days at both stages and that its stage one response can be in writing, face to face or via telephone.

Summary of Events

7. The landlord has advised this Service that the need for brickwork repairs became apparent in late October 2020, resulting from a technical officer permissions visit to inspect unrelated flagstone works rather than being a report from the resident. While at the property, the landlord has said that the technical officer noticed that a medium to long term job was needed as ‘there were some areas of pointing which could do with being re-pointed and a couple of lintels required where the brick on edge courses above the door and windows had started to bow slightly, with minor stepped cracking above the front door’.
8. The resident wrote to the landlord on 10-14 November 2020, raising concerns that she had not heard back from the member of staff who had visited her property about her flagstones and works to a wall. She said that she had not realised that she needed permission to carry out flagstone works at her property and that the member of staff who attended on 26 October 2020 had advised that pointing works were needed to sloping bricks in her wall. She noted he had left a message to confirm her flagstone works could proceed but she wanted to know if the brickwork repairs would be done.
9. A repair order was raised on 16 November 2020 for the landlord to complete patch pointing and lintel works to the resident’s property. It set a target date of 15 February 2021 for the works.
10. The landlord recorded that it had partly upheld the resident’s complaint on 18 November 2020 and closed the case verbally with her. It noted that it had explained that the member of staff concerned had been waiting on a line manager to return to work but it had apologised, confirmed that it should have kept the resident updated in the meantime and said that the brickwork pointing and lintel works had been raised on a 60-day order although the pandemic meant there was the potential for delay.
11. The landlord’s repairs records show that it made notes on 19 March 2021 indicating that there was a discrepancy between the job required and the costings involved. It recorded that an operative had attended that day and some liaison between staff members would be needed to establish whether to amend the original repair order or to raise a new one.
12. The resident submitted a complaint escalation on 31 March 2021 on the grounds that the brickwork repairs should have been done by February 2021 but this had not happened and she had only had an unannounced visit by an operative who measured up but she had heard nothing since.
13. The landlord’s records show that it reviewed the repair during early-mid April 2021 but noted that it had not received an expected quote for extra works from its contractor yet; it recorded receipt of the quote on 22 April 2021 – this included installation of lintels above the front door and windows to the front elevation and pointing of soft and cracked areas of mortar to the side elevation, at a low level either side of the front door, near a gulley and below a small ground floor window. The landlord established that the quote was higher than expected and included additional items so it had needed to query this with the contractor.
14. The landlord issued its final complaint response to the resident on 22 April 2021. It concluded that:
    1. it apologised that the resident was not kept updated following the November 2020 visit
    2. a repair order was raised following the visit but Covid-19 related delays and a backlog had occurred which meant the resident’s repair was overdue for which it apologised
    3. it apologised that no appointment was made in advance when the contractor attended to measure up the repair
    4. the contractor had advised of further works needed after their visit and this was being considered by its technical officer
    5. it had asked the contractor and technical officer to prioritise discussions to agree and start the works
    6. it said it would issue a follow-up response once works were agreed and a start date known.
15. The resident approached this Service through her MP in May 2021 on the grounds that she was no closer to knowing if works were going to be carried out. She added in July 2021 that she had been waiting more than a year for pointing and bracketing of bricks to the side and front of her property.
16. The landlord advised this Service in August 2021 that there had been a delay in communications from its contractor about the extent of works needed and that its technical officer expected to attend the property with the contractor by 13 August 2021 and complete works by 3 September 2021.
17. The resident has advised this Service as recently as 11 April 2022 that no works have been completed.

Assessment and findings

18. The landlord has recorded that it initially became aware of the need for brickwork pointing and lintel repairs to the outside of the resident’s property in late October 2020 during a visit about an unrelated matter. There is no evidence that the works required were urgent or that they were impacting on the resident’s living conditions.
19. The landlord has since advised that the works were medium to long term repairs. It raised the works as a non-urgent repair rather than through its planned investment programme. The job was raised on 16 November 2020 and it noted that it aimed to complete the repairs by 15 February 2021 – this was in accordance with its repairs policy target timescale for ‘batched repair’ jobs and was therefore appropriate.
20. The landlord noted during the first stage of its complaints process in November 2020 that it had apologised to the resident for the lack of communication with her following its visit to her property and confirmed that it had raised a repair to be completed by mid-February 2021 (albeit it recorded that it told her the impact of the pandemic may cause delay). The combination of the landlord’s apology, accurate update on progress and its attempt to manage the resident’s expectations on timescales put right its service failures in delaying between late October and mid-November 2020 in the raising of required works and its lack of updates to the resident.
21. However, the landlord failed to progress the brickwork and lintel repairs further and the works remained outstanding when the resident escalated her complaint in March 2021. This was inappropriate as it meant that the landlord failed to complete the repair in accordance with its repairs policy. In mitigation, the job was raised at a time when there was a second national lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic and a third national lockdown also occurred in January 2021. This will inevitably have impacted the landlord’s ability to progress works and this Service accepts that local authorities often had to transfer staff to frontline services to prioritise their response to the pandemic and that many landlords were conducting only emergency works at this time. Nevertheless, the landlord failed to pro-actively let the resident know during February 2021 that the works were on hold or to advise her when it thought it was likely to be able to progress them – this lack of communication was unreasonable.
22. There was also a discrepancy between the job that had been raised by the landlord and the extent of works that the contractor assessed to be necessary when it attended. The landlord attempted to resolve this discrepancy by liaising with its contractor during March-April 2021 and informed the resident of this in its final complaint response of 22 April 2021. It was reasonable that the landlord offered an explanation at this time and that it promised to update the resident further once it had decided on the extent of works.
23. However, there is no evidence that the landlord progressed the repairs between April 2021 (when the complaint exhausted its complaints process) and August 2021 (when it advised this Service that it expected to complete works by mid-September 2021). This meant that there was a further delay of more than three months at a time when lockdown restrictions were easing albeit it was inevitable that the landlord will have accrued a backlog of repairs to complete and needed to prioritise these. Nevertheless, the landlord’s continued failure to keep the resident updated was again unreasonable.
24. It is of concern that the resident has reported that works have still not been carried out, 12 months after the complaint exhausted the landlord’s complaints process (and 18 months after the repair was first identified). Even taking into account the impact of the pandemic, this represents an excessive delay.
25. The landlord’s delay in completing brickwork re-pointing and lintel repairs does not seem to have impacted on the resident’s living conditions given the works were external and were pro-actively assessed as necessary by the landlord rather than being reported by the resident. However, the lack of any substantial communication about the delays and plan for completion of works meant that the resident had to chase progress and will inevitably have become concerned about whether further damage could be caused to her property.
26. In summary, the landlord has delayed by more than a year in completing external brickwork and lintel repairs to the resident’s property. Some delays were inevitable due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic but the landlord exacerbated these by failing to establish the extent of works needed and failing to keep the resident sufficiently updated during this period; this will have caused inconvenience and unnecessary time and trouble to the resident.

Determination

27. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in its handling of brickwork repairs to the resident’s property.

Reasons

28. The landlord delayed unreasonably in completing brickwork repairs that were identified in October 2020 and failed to communicate appropriately with the resident during this period.

Orders

29. The landlord to write to the resident to:
    1. apologise for the service failures identified in this report;
    2. confirm when it will commence the repairs to her property, providing a detailed schedule of what works it intends to complete.
30. The landlord to pay the resident compensation of £350 in recognition of the inconvenience and time and trouble caused to her by the failures in its handling of brickwork repairs to her property.

The landlord should confirm compliance with these orders to this Service within four weeks of the date of this report.

Recommendations

31. The landlord to review its handling of this repair and create an action plan to ensure it can progress repairs in line with its repairs policy timescales when there is a discrepancy between the extent of works that it and its contractor believe to be required.

The landlord should confirm its intentions in regard to this recommendation to this Service within four weeks of the date of this report.