Town and Country Housing (202123546)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202123546

Town and Country Housing

7 June 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 response to the resident’s request for replacement windows, which the resident reported failed to block out noise.

Background

  1. The resident’s mother is a tenant of the landlord. The resident is a named occupant on the tenancy agreement, and lives in a house.
  2. The resident’s complaint concerned the landlord’s handling of his request to replace windows at his home. The resident reported that the condition of his windows was such, that they failed to block out noise from outside. The resident advised the landlord that he believed replacement windows would improve the issue.
  3. The landlord sent its surveyor to inspect the windows on 6 December 2021. The landlord’s surveyor reported that the condition of the windows was satisfactory, and they did not make any recommendations for repairs or replacements. They reported that there was a lot of condensation on the windows throughout the property, and that they advised the resident how to ventilate and wipe them down, in order to prevent the spread of mould and damp. The surveyor identified one blown sealed unit in the kitchen, but reported that the resident said that he did not consider this an issue.
  4. The landlord issued its final complaint response on 14 December 2021. It said it was satisfied that its inspection on 6 December confirmed that the windows were still in good condition and met its policy on repairs and cyclical replacement works. It agreed to monitor the condition of the resident’s windows going forward, as part of its stock condition surveys. It advised the resident, in line with the Decent Homes Standard, that his windows were not due to be replaced until 2033. The landlord confirmed that its complaints process had been completed and advised the resident how to contact this Service if he remained dissatisfied.
  5. The resident contacted this Service as he remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response, and to resolve his complaint he wanted the landlord to replace all the windows at his home.

Assessment and findings

  1. The landlord’s complaint response addressed several issues, including the landlord’s handling of reported antisocial behaviour, condensation and mould, and the housing needs of family members at the resident’s home. The only outstanding issue that the resident brought to this Service, was his belief that the landlord should replace all the windows at his property due to his concerns regarding the condition of the windows. Therefore, this investigation will focus on the landlord’s decision to not replace the windows as far as its final response, and whether this was reasonable in relation to any obligation it had to keep them in good repair.
  2. In accordance with Section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, the landlord is obliged to keep the windows in repair. Therefore, it was necessary for the landlord to investigate the resident’s concerns regarding the condition of his windows.
  3. In response to the resident’s complaint, the landlord referred to the Decent Homes Standard when providing him with a timeframe in which to expect window replacements. In its stage two response, the landlord clarified that the resident’s home was built in 1993, and thus said that the windows were not due for replacement until 2033. This was a reasonable response, as it was in accordance with the Decent Homes Standard, which states that the lifetime for windows in houses is forty years before being considered ‘old’, and a timeframe considered appropriate for landlords to use when planning replacement works.
  4. The forty-year lifetime for windows outlined in the Decent Homes Standard is not prescriptive, and a landlord would need to consider any premature failings in components such as windows prior to this. Therefore, given the resident’s concerns it was appropriate for the landlord to have its surveyor inspect the resident’s windows in December 2021. A landlord would usually only consider replacing windows following the recommendations of its suitably qualified staff, and nothing in the surveyor’s report shows that any renewals or repairs to the windows were recommended. As such, the landlord was entitled to rely on the opinion of its surveyor, and because of that, the landlord’s response to the complaint, and to the resident’s request for replacements, was reasonable.
  5. Although the landlord met its obligation to investigate the resident’s report about the windows by carrying out an inspection, it delayed in committing to doing this. The landlord’s mention of ‘blown sealed units’ in its stage one response indicates that it was aware of repair concerns at that time. Good practice would have been for the landlord to agree to an inspection in the first instance, and no evidence has been provided to suggest that there was a reasonable explanation for the landlord only agreeing to do so after the resident escalated his complaint. This was a service failure and undoubtedly would have caused the resident time and trouble in pursuing his complaint. As the resident’s complaint was recorded on 15 November 2021, and the inspection was attended to on 6 December 2021 (and considering there was no evidence that indicated the resident reported a repair issue with the windows prior to this), the delay was not considerable, and the result of the inspection did not change the overall outcome of the complaint.
  6. To remedy the above, the landlord should apologise to the resident and pay compensation of £50 for the time and trouble caused in pursuing the matter. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedy guidance which suggests that remedies in this range may be used for instances of service failure resulting in some impact on the complainant but were of short duration and may not have significantly affected the overall outcome for the complainant.
  7. It is evident that since the landlord’s final response, further inspections have been attended to and subsequent repairs agreed (though the nature of these repairs is unclear). The resident has also said that the landlord has since agreed to replace some of the windows at his home. In light of this, it is recommended that the landlord contacts the resident to provide an update on the current situation with the windows.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was service failure by the landlord in respect of the complaint.

Orders

  1. The landlord is ordered to do the following within four weeks of the date of this report:
    1. Apologise to the resident in writing for the service failure identified in this report.
    2. Pay the resident compensation of £50 in recognition of the time and trouble the resident went to in pursuing his concerns about the windows.

 

Recommendations

  1. It is recommended that within the next four weeks the landlord contacts the resident with an update on the current position regarding the window repairs.