The Riverside Group Limited (202201403)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202201403

The Riverside Group Limited

28 February 2023

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 the repairs to the heating and hot water system, and the amount of compensation offered.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord.
3. The resident reported no heating or hot water on 13 January 2022. An engineer attended the following day and determined a new part was needed. On 24 January 2022, an engineer attended and fitted the first part. During this visit it was determined that a second part was needed. The second part was fitted on 01 February 2022. On 03 February 2022, it was discovered a third part was needed. The resident raised a complaint on 11 February 2022, as she had raised numerous issues with the boiler and it remained unresolved. These included additional costs incurred with gas and electric having to use an electric heater and not being able to self-regulate the heating system.
4. On 18 February 2022, the third part was fitted to the boiler. The contractors recommended a new boiler on 1 March 2022, as the old one was now felt to be beyond economic repair. It was replaced on 12 March 2022. Later in March, the landlord and resident discussed her request for compensation for additional costs for gas and electricity for January 2022 to March 2022, due to the resident being unable to self-regulate the heating system, for inconvenience and frustration from poor communication, time away from work, and emotional and physical distress. She asked for £4355.76.
5. The landlord provided its stage one response on 28 April 2022. It addressed each of the resident’s concerns point by point and acknowledged several failings. In response to the issues being investigated here it acknowledged two missed appointments, attending appointments outside of its repairs timescale, and using withheld phone numbers despite the resident’s request not to do so. It offered her £250 compensation to acknowledge its failings and delays in resolving the matter. The resident escalated her complaint on 19 May 2022, as she felt the compensation offered did not reflect the inconvenience and stress she and her family experienced. The landlord provided its response on 27 May 2022. It acknowledged the possible costs incurred with gas and electricity and offered an additional £250 towards those costs.
6. The resident brought her complaint to this Service because she remained unhappy with the landlord’s handling of the repairs and compensation.  

Assessment and findings

Policies and procedures

7. The landlord’s repairs policy states that the loss of heating and hot water are both classified as emergency repairs and will be attended within twelve hours. If further work is needed, the full repair should be done within three days.

Repairs to the boiler and complaint handling

8. It took the landlord approximately two months (from 13 January 2022 to 12 March 2022) to fully resolve the issue with the resident’s heating and hot water. However, that period was made up of at least three separate repair reports. The first and second reports were made on 13 and 14 January 2022. As no one attended on 13 January, the resident made a report the following day. The delay from 13 January was due to the report not being sent on to the repairs team when it was made. The third report was made on 3 February, and attended on 11 February. The delay was due to waiting for parts.
9. Outside of the reports there were several visits made. Most of these visits identified that replacement parts were needed, each of which required up to six days to be obtained and installed. The majority of the landlord’s initial responses to the resident’s reports were within 24 hours, which is the basic standard time frame recommended by the Right to Repair Scheme (using the Scheme as a basic guide and point of reference). The need for replacement parts meant that the landlord’s three-day target could not realistically be met. Nothing in the evidence provided for this investigation indicates that the landlord was in a position to act faster to complete the repairs, or that it was otherwise lax in its handling of them.
10. The number of visits needed to attend to each repair report, and finally to replace the boiler, was understandably frustrating for the resident. Sometimes the nature and circumstances of a repair means that multiple visits are required to fully identify and resolve it. In this case, the evidence does not show that any of the visits were unnecessary, or were due to any clear failing by the landlord or its contractors.
11. Nonetheless, the landlord acknowledged that the resident had experienced inconvenience and frustration from its handling of the repairs, as well as increased energy usage from the temporary heater it had provided. It apologised, and explained in detail how it would seek to improve its repair work order processes. It offered the resident £250 for any extra costs she had incurred (including from a period when she had been unable to regulate or turn down the heating), and a further £250 for the inconvenience caused to her and her family. These remedies were reasonable and proportionate in the circumstances, given an absence of evidence showing the specific level of costs incurred by the resident, and the lack of evidence suggesting the landlord was in a position to resolve the repairs earlier.
12. The landlord acknowledged that it had not followed the resident’s requests regarding withheld phone numbers. It apologised, and explained how it would amend its processes to provide greater visibility of tenants’ communication preferences. Along with the compensation the landlord offered for the inconvenience caused to the resident, this was a reasonable and appropriate remedy, showing that the landlord had taken the issue seriously and sought meaningful ways in which to avoid the same mistakes occurring again.

Determination (decision)

13. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord has made an offer of redress prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint satisfactorily.

Recommendation

14. This finding is based partly on the landlord completing its compensation offer. If it has not done so already, the landlord should make the £500 payment to the resident within four weeks of this report.