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London & Quadrant Housing Trust (202206543)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202206543

London & Quadrant Housing Trust

3 April 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 response to reports that the resident’s window had been broken.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord. The property is a house.
  2. On the morning of 8 March 2022, the resident’s daughter and son both requested that the landlord repair the resident’s window, as somebody had thrown a TV through it. They provided a crime reference number and explained that the resident was elderly and vulnerable and the broken window meant the property was cold and not secure. They said they were advised by the landlord that it would attend that day.
  3. When nobody had attended by 4pm that day, the resident’s daughter called the landlord again and was told that the job had been cancelled twice but somebody was now on their way. She rang back at 6pm and was told a subcontractor would arrive within 4 hours. However, when she rang the subcontractor around 6.30pm, the person who answered was not aware of the job. She reported this back to the landlord who said it would need to speak to the subcontractor. By around 9pm, having heard nothing more and with further calls to the landlord going unanswered, the resident’s daughter paid an emergency glazier £150 to repair the window. The landlord’s subcontractor arrived at 11am the following day, but the window had already been repaired.
  4. On 12 March 2022 the resident’s son raised a complaint on behalf of the resident which said that due to the nature of the repair and the fact that his mother was vulnerable, the repair should have been made a priority and the window made safe that day. He said the landlord’s contractor said they had received the job on 8 March 2022 but had decided to do it the next morning. He requested that the £150 paid to the emergency glazier be reimbursed.
  5. In its stage one complaint response on 23 March 2022, the landlord said it would reimburse the £150 once it had received the invoice and would also award additional compensation for the distress and time taken. It said it was unclear why multiple jobs had been raised and cancelled but it may have been due to more than one relative calling. It said call staff did not always explain that the timeframe for emergency (P1) repairs was 24 hours.
  6. It explained that due to staff availability issues within its repair team, it had to ask a subcontractor to carry out the job. It said as the subcontractor received the job later in the day they were not aware that it had originally been raised at around 8am and should have been completed within 24 hours of that time. It said that learnings had been made including that it should raise and action of P1 repairs more efficiently, raise jobs to subcontractors to ensure timeframes were met, and ensure better scrutinization of P1 repairs if they require urgent work and cannot be left until the following day. It said it would arrange to complete the repair to the window and explained how the resident could escalate the complaint.
  7. The resident’s son contacted the landlord to escalate her complaint on 31 March, explaining that the window had already been repaired and reiterating that repair should have been completed sooner because of the resident’s vulnerability. He felt that the landlord did not have appropriate policies, systems and processes in place to deal with the situation and that the call centre staff did not have the necessary skills to assess vulnerability and safeguarding issues. He also said the resident’s daughter had suffered an angina attack which he believed was caused by the stress of the landlord failing to repair the window.
  8. On 4 April 2022, the landlord confirmed that it would reimburse the resident the £150 for the glazier and offered a further £50 for the poor level of service and £50 for their time and effort, bringing the total amount of compensation to £250. The resident’s son emailed the landlord to request an addition £100 to cover the stress and injury caused to the resident’s daughter in relation to her angina.
  9. In its response on 19th April 2022 the landlord said that it did not consider awards for personal injury within its complaints process and that it considered its total compensation offer of £250 to be reasonable. It said there would be ongoing training to ensure that emergency repairs that cannot be left overnight are completed the same day. On 26 July 2022, after contacting this Service, the resident requested a formal stage two complaint response.
  10. In its final, stage two, complaint response on 16 August 2022 the landlord said that the correct job and policy were applied to the works and apologised for the distress of waiting for the window to be fixed. It awarded an additional £50 compensation for its delay in issuing a formal stage two complaint response, binging the total offered to £300. The resident’s son contacted this Service as the resident was dissatisfied with the landlord’s response as it had not addressed the issue that repairs for vulnerable residents should be prioritised, or compensated for the impact on the resident’s daughter’s health.

Assessment and findings

  1. The resident’s son has referenced how the landlord’s failure to complete the window repair the same day impacted the resident’s daughter’s health. The Ombudsman cannot draw conclusions on the causation of, or liability for, impacts on health and wellbeing. This is because we cannot establish whether there was a direct link between the landlord’s actions and/or inaction and the resident’s health. This would be more appropriately dealt with as a personal injury claim through the courts or the landlord’s liability insurer. This is an accordance with paragraph 42 (g) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme which says the Ombudsman will not investigate complaints which concern matters where the Ombudsman considers it quicker, fairer, more reasonable or more effective to seek a remedy through the courts, a designated person, other tribunal or procedure.
  2. The landlord has a vulnerable resident policy which advises its employees to consider whether a resident is potentially vulnerable, and if they are, to ask what support needs they have and record any vulnerabilities on its system so that other colleagues can take the vulnerabilities into account in future. It explains that vulnerability may include those “vulnerable due to physical disability, chronic illness, or age-related frailty” that “may put them at risk in their home or prevent them from accessing our services”.
  3. The landlord’s responsive repairs policy confirms that it will repair broken windows where a crime reference number is provided. It also says for routine day to day repairs, it aims to complete the repair at the earliest mutually convenient appointment and, for emergency works, where there is an immediate danger to the occupant or members of the public, it will attend within 24 hours. However, it also says that it is able to adjust its service standards where a delay would put a vulnerable resident at risk because of their condition.
  4. On 8 March 2022, when the resident’s daughter reported to the landlord that the resident’s window had been smashed and provided with a crime number the landlord recognised it responsibility to repair the window, acting appropriately and in line with its repairs policy by raising an emergency appointment. As the resident’s son and daughter had explained that the resident was vulnerable and the property was cold and not secure, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have noted the resident’s vulnerability in the description of the job in the repairs records so that whoever carried out the job was aware of the vulnerability and that the job should be attended that day. Although the repair records show that the resident’s vulnerability was noted in this way for some previous jobs, the landlord failed to add details of the resident’s vulnerability on this occasion.
  5. Although there was some initial confusion with duplicate jobs being raised and cancelled, once the landlord was aware that its own repair team were not able to attend that day due to staffing availability, it took appropriate steps to arrange for a subcontractor to attend. However, as the subcontractor was not allocated the job until later that day, it would also have been appropriate for the landlord to have informed the subcontractor that the job had originally been raised around 8am, that the resident was vulnerable and that she was expecting them to attend that day. The landlord failed to do this.
  6. This resulted in the resident’s daughter making further calls to both the landlord and the subcontractor and eventually having to pay an emergency glazier to repair the window so that it was not left overnight. By the time the subcontractor attended at around 11am the following day the repair had already been completed. The landlord therefore failed to attend either within the original same-day timeframe it had quoted, or within the 24 hour timeframe for emergency repairs, failed to communicate effectively with the resident and failed to record the resident’s vulnerability on the repair records.
  7. In its stage one complaint response and subsequent responses to the resident, the landlord appropriately acknowledged, and apologised for the delay in attending, and agreed to reimburse the £150 glazier costs. It also awarded compensation of £50 for the poor service received from the call centre, and £50 for time and effort. As it also failed to initially provide a formal stage two complaint response in response to the resident’s escalation request, it acted appropriately by issuing one on 16 August 2022 and awarding a further £50 compensation for the delay in issuing it. It also acted reasonably by explaining that it would not address the resident’s daughter’s angina attack, as it did not award compensation for personal injuries within in its complaints policy. However, it would have been helpful if it had signposted it to its public liability insurance or the relevant department that did deal with personal injury claims.
  8. The resident’s complaint made specific reference to there not appearing to be any policy or procedure to enable certain repairs for vulnerable residents to be completed sooner than the 24 hour emergency timeframe, and that its call centre staff did not appear to have the skills to identify or meet vulnerable residents’ needs. In view of that it would have been appropriate for the landlord, in its complaint responses, to have addressed those points and to have explained that its responsive repairs policy did include an option for it to reduce response times for vulnerable residents, and that it also had a vulnerable residents policy which advises employees to identify and record any resident vulnerabilities, so that their needs could be met in future.
  9. Although the compensation originally awarded was appropriate for the failings the landlord had identified, as this Service has identified further failings during this investigation, a finding of maladministration has been made and the landlord ordered to pay the resident an additional £100 compensation. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance for cases where there was a failure which adversely affected the resident and the landlord has acknowledged failings and/or made some attempt to put things right but failed to address the detriment to the resident and/or the offer was not proportionate to the failings identified by our investigation.
  10. The landlord has also been ordered to apologise to the resident, to contact the resident to ensure that it has an up to date record of all vulnerabilities in the household, and to provide a written explanation of what steps it will be taking to ensure that the vulnerability information is permanently recorded and made available to relevant to staff and subcontractors. The landlord has also been ordered to arrange refresher training for relevant employees to ensure that they are acting in line with its vulnerable residents policy as well as the section of the responsive repairs policy that applies to vulnerable residents.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in respect of its response to the request that it repair the resident’s smashed window.

Orders and recommendations

  1. Within four weeks of the date of this determination the landlord is ordered to:
    1. Pay the resident a further £100 compensation, in addition to the £300 it has already paid.
    2. Apologise to the resident for its maladministration in its response to the request that it repair the resident’s smashed window.
    3. Contact the resident to ensure it has an accurate record of any vulnerabilities in the household.
    4. Provide a written explanation to the resident of the steps it will be taking to ensure that there is a permanent record of any vulnerabilities in the household and that its staff and contractors are made aware of this information when arranging and attending repairs appointments.
  2. Within six weeks of the date of this report the landlord is ordered to arrange refresher training for relevant employees to ensure they are aware of, and acting in line with its vulnerable resident policy and section 4.4 of its responsive repairs policy which relates to vulnerable residents.
  3. The landlord is to confirm to this service that it has complied with the above orders.