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Newcastle City Council (202109620)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202109620

Newcastle City Council

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 refers to the landlord’s handling of:
    1. Repairs to unblock the resident’s bath pipe.
    2. The associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is a tenant of the landlord, which it a local authority. The property is a flat.
  2. The resident initially reported that his bath was not draining on 2 July 2021. He requested that a Saturday appointment was arranged due to his work commitments. An appointment was arranged for 10 July 2021, however, no one attended in the morning and the resident needed to call the landlord to arrange another appointment for that day. When a contractor turned up in the afternoon they said that they could not complete the work as it was a two-man job. The resident called again that day and another operative was sent. The operative unblocked the drain and said that they would need to re-attend on 12 July 2021 to replace some pipework. The bath panel was removed and cracked by the operative and boxing in the bathroom was taken out to allow for the pipes to be replaced. On 12 July 2021 the operative reattended and said that they did not need to replace the pipework. The bath panel was re-fitted on 22 July 2021. 
  3. The resident raised a complaint regarding the missed appointment, the contractor initially refusing to complete the work and the time he had spent off work on the Saturday and Monday only for no work to be completed. He also requested compensation as he had repaired the boxing in the bathroom himself. He was also concerned that he had experienced difficulty arranging a Saturday appointment despite maintaining that he had a verbal agreement in place due to his work commitments.  He later expressed concern that despite asking for a complaint to be raised, he had received no acknowledgment or reference number. The resident made multiple phone calls to the landlord throughout the process to follow-up on his complaint. 
  4. In response to the resident’s complaint, the landlord explained that the appointment on 10 July 2021 had been scheduled but required cancelling due to a personal incident involving the plumber. It said it could not foresee this issue and apologised that the resident was not contacted and updated. In view of the inconvenience the landlord offered £50 compensation. It noted that an appointment to repair the boxing in the resident’s bathroom was being arranged, however, the resident had decided to do this repair himself. It denied the resident’s request for additional compensation. It confirmed that the outstanding repair to the bath panel had now been resolved. It apologised for the delay in acknowledging the resident’s complaint and explained that this was due to the investigation and the number of staff members involved through several teams. It also noted that its system for reporting repair issues was down, but once it was back up and running, the resident would be able to book Saturday appointments moving forward.
  5. The resident referred his complaint to this Service as he remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response, its communication and the level of compensation offered. He also raised concerns about the landlord’s handling of his complaint.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of repairs to unblock the resident’s bath pipe

  1. The tenancy agreement states that the landlord is responsible for repairs needed to baths and drains. The landlord’s website states that it carries out urgent repairs, including those to plumbing and drainage, within one to seven days depending on the risk to the resident. It attends to routine repairs, including those to bathroom and kitchen fittings, within 15 days.
  2. It was reasonable for an appointment to be arranged on 10 July 2021 to unblock the bath following the resident’s report of the issue on 2 July 2021. Whilst this was slightly outside of the landlord’s seven-day timescale for urgent repairs, the delay was reasonable as the resident was only available for weekend appointments due to his work commitments.
  3. The landlord has acted fairly by acknowledging the missed appointment scheduled for the morning of 10 July 2021 and apologising to the resident for any inconvenience caused by its failure to let him know in advance. The landlord has explained that the appointment needed to be cancelled due to the contractor experiencing a personal issue which was unforeseeable. The landlord’s offer of £50 for the missed appointment was proportionate in view of the inconvenience caused. The offer was also in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance which states that amounts in this range are suitable where there has been service failure which had an impact on the resident but was of short duration and may not have significantly affected the overall outcome of the complaint.
  4. The landlord would not be obliged to compensate the resident for the time he had taken off work on Saturday and Monday as residents have an obligation to allow access for appointments in line with their tenancy agreements. It is noted that the contractor who attended on 12 July 2021 did not replace any pipework as previously advised. While it is understandable that the resident was frustrated that he had left work early only for no repairs to be carried out, this would not amount to a service failure on the part of the landlord, as it was entitled to rely on the opinion of its qualified staff and contractors who had established that the pipe replacement was no longer necessary following the further visit.
  5. Furthermore, the landlord would not be expected to compensate the resident for the costs associated with repairing the boxing in the bathroom, this is because the resident did not allow the landlord sufficient opportunity to rectify this issue before completing the work himself. The landlord acted reasonably by arranging for the bath panel to be re-fitted on 22 July 2021, which was within its timescales for routine repairs.
  6. In its correspondence with the resident, the landlord explained that routine repairs could be booked inside its working hours (Monday to Friday) and these would either be a morning, afternoon or all-day slot. Outside of its normal working hours, only emergency repairs to make safe any immediate risk could be booked. The resident maintained that he had a verbal agreement that appointments for routine repairs could be booked at weekends due to his work commitments and expressed dissatisfaction that he had experienced difficulty arranging a Saturday appointment. The landlord made reasonable effort to explain its position to the resident and that Saturday appointments would need to be booked through a manager as it was not its usual process. The landlord has since confirmed that its policy had changed and routine repairs could now be booked at weekends via its repairs portal.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

  1. The landlord’s complaints policy states that complaints should be initially handled at the first point of contact. The complaint should be investigated and responded to immediately. If the resident remains dissatisfied with the landlord’s informal response, the complaint would enter the formal process. At stage one of the formal process, the complaint should be acknowledged within two working days giving the resident the name of the person investigating the complaint, and a response should be issued in writing within ten working days. If the resident remains dissatisfied, they can escalate their complaint to stage two. At stage two, the landlord should respond within ten working days.
  2. The resident initially asked for a complaint to be raised regarding the landlord’s handling of the blocked bath on 14 July 2021, this was treated as a service request and responded to the same day. Following which, the resident confirmed that his complaint had not been resolved and asked for a reference number. At this stage, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have escalated the resident’s complaint to stage one of its formal complaints process in line with its policy as the resident remained dissatisfied with its informal response.
  3. The resident’s complaint was not acknowledged at this stage and the evidence provided shows that the resident followed up with the landlord on multiple occasions in relation to the complaint. While individual members of staff confirmed that emails had been sent to its complaint department, there is no evidence to suggest that the resident was provided with information about what stage his complaint was at, who would be responding and when he would be likely to receive a response.
  4. It is noted that the landlord has acknowledged and apologised that the complaint was initially logged informally by a member of staff no longer working for it, which was the reason an acknowledgment letter was not sent. While it was reasonable for the landlord to apologise for this error, given the resident’s repeated requests for a reference number and acknowledgement of the complaint, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have provided this once it was aware that an acknowledgement had not been sent.
  5. The landlord provided its final response to the resident on 5 August 2021, exceeding its published target by 6 working days. While there may be circumstances where it is reasonable for the landlord to respond outside of its published targets, it should keep the person complaining adequately updated and there is no evidence that the resident was told when could expect to receive a response. Furthermore, the landlord has not provided evidence to confirm that a written stage one complaint response was issued to the resident in line with its policy. As such, the resident did not have sufficient opportunity to respond to the landlord’s position, or escalate his complaint which is likely to have caused further inconvenience. 
  6. It is acknowledged that the resident has made a considerable number of telephone calls to the landlord about the complaint, and on some occasions he made multiple calls in one day. The resident needed to allow the landlord a reasonable opportunity to respond to him before following up, and it is understandable that his level of contact may have caused difficulties in the landlord managing the complaint as well as impacting on the level of service it was able to provide to other residents.
  7. However, there has been service failure by the landlord in respect of its handling of the resident’s complaint. The landlord has not demonstrated that it took adequate steps to follow its complaint policy or manage the resident’s expectations of when he would receive a complaint response. This is likely to have caused distress and inconvenience to the resident. In view of this, the landlord should pay the resident additional compensation as detailed below. It is also recommended that the landlord carries out staff training for complaint handlers to ensure that the correct process is followed when a complaint is received.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 55(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord has made an offer of redress which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint about the bath repairs satisfactorily.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in respect of its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

  1. The landlord is ordered to pay the resident £100 compensation for the distress and inconvenience caused by its poor complaint handling. This should be done within four weeks of the date of this report.
  2. It is recommended that the landlord does the following within four weeks of the date of this report:
    1. Pays the amount of £50 previously offered to the resident if this has not already been paid.
    2. Carries out staff training for complaint handlers to ensure that the correct process is followed when a complaint is received.