Poplar Housing And Regeneration Community Association Limited (202204748)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202204748

Poplar Housing And Regeneration Community Association Limited

11 March 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 resident’s reports of a:
   1. Leak in the property.
   2. Mice infestation in the property.

Background

2. The resident is a secured tenant of the landlord. The property is a second floor flat, situated in a block of flats.
3. The resident has stated that he initially reported a mice infestation in 2021. The landlord says that it received no report of this from the local authority (who deals with its pest infestations as part of a service level agreement) or from the resident until April 2022.
4. On 4 April 2022 the landlord attended a neighbouring property due to a leak, which was later traced to the hot water supply in the resident’s property. Throughout April 2022 the landlord carried out works to resolve the leak. The repairs were ultimately completed on 11 April 2022, with follow-on works needed to make good the bathroom once the works had dried.
5. On 14 April 2022 the resident reported the mice infestation to the landlord and stated that it was damaging the pipework in the bathroom of his property. The landlord raised an inspection of the property, which found a gap behind the plinths of the kitchen units which was allowing mice into the property. The contractors set baited traps, which it continued to inspect.
6. The resident asked for a complaint to be raised on 28 April 2022. He was dissatisfied that the pest infestation which had taken a year to resolve, and that the leak had taken a month to resolve. The resident stated that he was frustrated with the delays, and the lack of communication from the landlord. The resident stated that the issues had been inconvenient and had disturbed him and his family during their religious holiday celebrations. The resident also added that the works had resulted in damage to the liner in his kitchen. The resident was seeking £1,000 compensation for his loss of income and the inconvenience of the delays.
7. The landlord inspected the traps again on 3 May 2022 and, due to no infestation being found, it carried out the repairs needed in the property such as repairing the bath panel and mastic.
8. The landlord provided its stage two complaint response on 8 June 2022. It partially upheld the complaint on the basis that there was poor communication between it and the local authority which resulted in delays and inconvenience for the resident. As redress, it offered £250 compensation and confirmed that it would complete a review of the communication between the local authority and the landlord about pest control, in order to learn from its failings. However, it concluded that there were no failings in its handling of the leak because it had dealt with it correctly and followed its processes.
9. The resident subsequently escalated his complaint to this Service. He said he was seeking £1,000 compensation made up of £500 for the landlord’s handling of the pest infestation and £500 for its handling of the leak. He was dissatisfied with the length of time it had taken the landlord to resolve the issues and that this had resulted in a loss of earnings.

Assessment and findings

Policies and Procedures

10. The tenancy agreement states that it is the resident’s responsibility to manage infestations of rodents in the property, and the associated cost of doing so. It also states that residents should act in a timely manner once they are aware of an infestation. The pest information available on the landlord’s website advises residents to contact the local authority to arrange treatment.
11. The landlord’s repairs policy states that non-emergency repairs will be carried out within 14 days. It states that examples of non-emergency repairs are a contained water leak and repairing waste water pipes. It also states that repairs to water and waste pipes are the landlord’s responsibility.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a leak in the property

12. The leak was initially reported on 4 April 2022, and it was resolved on 11 April 2022. This was a total of five working days, which was in line with the landlord’s repairs policy. However, following the leak being resolved, works were raised to make good the affected area in the bathroom. The follow-on works were then completed on 3 May 2022. Overall, the leak and follow-on works were resolved within 19 working days.
13. The landlord’s repairs policy states that non-emergency repairs will be completed within 14 working days. Whilst in this case, it had taken the landlord 19 working days to resolve the leak and complete the follow-on repairs, it should be noted that it can take more than one attempt to resolve issues such as leaks, as it can be difficult to identify the cause of issue at the outset and in some case different repairs may need to be attempted before the matter is resolved. This would not necessarily constitute a service failure by the landlord.
14. The landlord attended on several occasions throughout the repairs period to trace the root cause of the leak to the hot water supply and considered advice from its qualified staff on the best way to resolve it. This is evidence of the landlord progressing the repairs in a prompt manner, and its actions were reasonable in the circumstances. It is also evidence that it had taken the resident’s concerns seriously.
15. Although there was a delay between the landlord raising the follow-on works on 12 April 2022, and the follow-on works being completed on 3 May 2022, this was due to the resident’s reports of a mice infestation, which he had stated was damaging the pipework in the bathroom. It was therefore not unreasonable for the landlord to delay works to make good the area under the bath which had been affected by the leak, as it needed to investigate the resident’s reports of an infestation which seemed to be impacting the same area.
16. When considering these factors, it was reasonable for the landlord to conclude in its complaint responses that there had been no failings in its handling of the leak.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a mice infestation in the property

17. The landlord did not dispute that there had been delays in the pest infestation being resolved and that the resident had been impacted by distress and inconvenience.
18. The resident stated that he initially reported the infestation in 2021, a year prior to the landlord attending. The landlord has stated that this would have been reported to the local council and it had received no report from either the resident or the council about the infestation until 14 April 2022, when the resident had informed it. The Ombudsman relies on evidence in order to determine any actions or lack thereof. As there is no evidence to suggest that the resident had informed the landlord of the infestation prior to this, it would not be reasonable to expect the landlord to have resolved the infestation at an earlier stage.
19. Although the tenancy agreement states that residents are responsible for managing infestations of rodents in the property, and the associated cost of doing so, the landlord’s website advises residents to contact the local council to arrange treatments. In addition, in the landlord’s stage one complaint response, it stated that the council attends to treatments for the landlord as part of a service level agreement and, that if the council is unsuccessful in treating the property, it is supposed to provide the landlord with a report so that it could complete further treatments. This somewhat sets the expectation that the landlord takes responsibility for pest infestations within the property, and it therefore acted appropriately by inspecting the property and completing any necessary treatments once it was aware of the infestation.
20. The landlord’s records show that it was made aware of the infestation on 14 April 2022, and it was ultimately resolved on 3 May 2022. This was a total of 11 working days. It should be noted that pest control issues may take more than one attempt to resolve, as landlords will often need to carry out a series of treatments. The landlord attended on 14 and 28 April and 3 May 2022 where it investigated the infestation and set baited traps. This is evidence that once the landlord was aware of the infestation, it took the resident’s concerns seriously and took appropriate steps to try and resolve it. On 3 May 2022, as no bait had been taken from the traps in the property, the landlord reasonably concluded that the infestation had been resolved and completed works to rodent‑proof the area which the landlord suspected was allowing the mice in.
21. Following this the resident informed the landlord that, due to the inspections that had taken place, the flooring in the kitchen had been damaged when kitchen units were being moved. The resident gave the landlord an indication of the cost of flooring for the property as a whole that had been completed about two years previously and said that he did not have the receipt. The landlord assured him on 9 May 2022 that “no receipts would be required regarding the flooring”.  This matter was not address specifically in its complaint handling. It would have been reasonable for the landlord to have the signposted the resident to its insurer who would be able to assess the damage and reach a decision on whether it was a result of any negligence by the landlord. Its failure to do so was a service failure. An order has been made, below, for the landlord to do so now.
22. The landlord also appropriately considered the resident’s request to be compensated for a loss of earnings, but ultimately concluded that it would not provide compensation for this. In general, the Ombudsman does not propose compensation to reimburse a resident for time off work or loss of wages. Whilst some works are likely to cause some inconvenience to residents, the tenancy agreement states that residents must permit access for works.
23. In its complaint handling, the landlord recognised that it should monitor reports made to the local authority of any pest infestations more closely and stated that the lack of communication that had occurred between the landlord and local authority had resulted in distress for the resident. It committed to completing a review of its process with the local authority, which is evidence of it trying to improve its service and offered the resident £250 compensation. This Service considers that is proportionate redress for the distress and inconvenience caused to the resident.

Determination

24. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme there was service failure by the landlord in respect of its handling of the resident’s reports of a mice infestation in the property.
25. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration by the landlord in respect of the landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of a leak in the property.

Order

26. The landlord should take the following action within four weeks of the date of this report and provide the Ombudsman with evidence of compliance with this order:
    1. Provide the resident with information about how to make a claim on its landlord’s insurance with respect to the kitchen flooring.
    2. Pay the resident the sum of £250 offered during its complaint handling (if this has not been paid previously).