Nottingham City Homes Registered Provider Limited (202217461)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202217461

Nottingham City Homes Registered Provider Limited

30 May 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 concerns:
   1. How the landlord handled the resident’s reports of draughts in the property.
   2. The associated formal complaint into this matter.

Background

2. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord, which is a housing association. The property is a house. The landlord has vulnerabilities recorded for the resident relating to her age and for partial sightedness.
3. The resident has been in contact with the landlord since at least December 2021 regarding cold draughts in the property. The landlord raised work orders on 10 and 21 December 2021 to investigate the issue and then raised a further work order on 21 February 2022 to inspect a cupboard when it was informed by the resident that the draught was still present.
4. On 21 March 2022, a local councillor wrote to the landlord on behalf of the resident’s family to pass on their concerns as to how the landlord was handling the matter and to describe the effect the issue was having on the resident. On receipt of the email, the landlord arranged for an inspection of the property for 30 March 2022. Work to replace the boiler in the property was also booked to be completed between 30 March 2022 and 4 April 2022. The landlord’s notes of the inspection stated that it completed a repair to the fireplace, informed the resident that the new boiler should improve the level of heating in the property and agreed to continue to monitor the situation.
5. The resident called the landlord on 6 April 2022 and expressed her dissatisfaction that it had yet to resolve the issue. The landlord opened a formal complaint into the matter. It sent a stage one complaint response on 12 April 2022, a follow-up to its stage one response on 5 July 2022, then a stage two complaint response on 31 October 2022. In its responses, the landlord:
   1. Explained that it in order to locate the source of the draught in the property, it had undertaken the following work:
      1. Undertook inspections of the property on 4 and 12 April 2022
      2. Sealed all air vents and inspected all the windows for signs of draughts.
      3. Covered the floor with plywood and sealed the edges of the flooring.
      4. Inspected the vent behind the electric fire.
      5. Installed a new boiler.
   2. Informed the resident that the property had an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) banding of C, which exceeded the minimum threshold of D. The landlord explained that this meant that the property was deemed to be efficient to a necessary standard in terms of heat loss.
   3. Declined the resident’s request for a reduction in rent and stated that it was satisfied that its repairs team had taken appropriate action to detect any faults or defects that required attention and that none were identified.
   4. Addressed the resident’s request for a surveyor to inspect the property and explained it did not consider it necessary.
   5. Explained that as it had not identified any faults or defects that required its attention or repairs, it did not propose to take any further action. The landlord also noted that the staff members who visited the property during the two inspections undertaken in April 2022 had not felt any draughts in the property.
   6. Apologised for the delay in escalating the complaint to stage two of its complaints process and offered the resident £100 compensation for the inconvenience that this had caused.
6. In referring the case to this Service, the resident described the outstanding issue of the complaint was that the landlord had yet to locate the source of the draught. As a resolution to the complaint, the resident requested that an inspection of the property was undertaken by a surveyor or another suitably qualified professional.

Assessment and findings

Relevant policies and procedures

7. Section 4.2 of the tenancy agreement relates to repairs and maintenance. This, in part, states that the landlord is responsible for “keeping the structure of the property in repair. Keeping in proper working order the [landlord’s] installations for room heating and hot water. Keeping in proper working order all the [landlord’s] fixtures and fittings”.
8. The landlord’s repairs policy categorises its repair types as “Emergency” (attend and make safe within four hours, complete within three working days) and “Appointed” (complete within 30 working days). The landlord defines an emergency repair as a repair “which needs to be carried out to avoid serious danger to health and safety or where a failure to carry out the repair could cause extensive damage to buildings and property”.
9. The landlord operates a two-stage complaints process. When a complaint is received, the landlord aims to provide a response at stage one within ten working days. If the complainant is dissatisfied with the response, they can request an escalation of the complaint to the next stage. The landlord will then undertake a review of the complaint and provide a stage two response within 20 working days. This will be the landlord’s final response to the complaint.
10. The landlord’s compensation policy describes the circumstances where it will consider offering a complainant discretionary compensation. This includes when it has “failed to meet our own service targets (e.g. failed to attend an appointment, carry out a service within the agreed timescale, or keep the customer informed throughout a process)”.

How the landlord handled the resident’s reports of draughts in the property

11. When the resident informed the landlord of the draught she was experiencing in the property in December 2021, it had a duty to respond to the matter in line with its obligations set out in the tenancy agreement and its published policies and procedures. The landlord’s repair logs state that an inspection was then arranged for 16 December 2021 where possible sources of the draught were inspected. Following further reports of draughts, a second inspection was arranged for 2 February 2022. This resulted in a repair to a wooden cupboard in the living room, which was marked as completed on 21 February 2022.Following the email sent by the local councillor on 21 March 2022, another inspection was arranged for 30 March 2022 where the landlord discussed the issue with the resident. The boiler was also replaced in the property at this time. While this repair was not raised as a direct result of the draught, the landlord noted that the new boiler would improve the heating in the property.
12. A further inspection and meeting with the resident at the property was arranged for 12 April 2022 following the opening of the formal complaint on 8 April 2022. As a result of this meeting, work orders were raised to block the ground floor air vents and to cover the flooring with plywood (completed on 22 April 2022).
13. Work orders were raised on 2 May 2022 to remove floorboards to investigate underneath (completed on 9 August 2022) and to undertake further work to block the air vents (completed on 25 August 2022). These two jobs were not completed within the landlord’s published target for an appointed repair. In September 2022 the landlord discussed the option of adding sensors to the property’s heating system to monitor the temperature. However, it is not clear from the evidence provided that this went ahead.
14. Overall, the landlord has acted appropriately to the resident’s reports. It acted promptly when it was informed by the resident that she was experiencing cold draughts in the living room of the property. The landlord’s repair logs and internal correspondence show that it looked to eliminate possible sources of the draught and raised work orders to seal up likely entry points. The recommended work was correctly classified as appointed repairs as the level of discomfort the draughts were causing the resident would not meet the threshold of an emergency repair.
15. While it would be understandably frustrating for the resident that the landlord had been unable to find the source of the draught, the evidence shows that the landlord has taken reasonable steps to investigate the issue and to identify any outstanding remedial repairs it could undertake that could be the cause of the issue. It also improved the heating system in the property by installing a new boiler. Therefore, there is no evidence of service failure in how the landlord has responded to the resident’s reports.
16. In a letter the resident sent to the landlord CEO on 24 June 2022 (which the landlord responded to in its stage one follow-up response sent on 5 July 2022), the resident requested that a surveyor inspect the property. This request was declined by the landlord on the grounds that a surveyor would not reach a different conclusion than that of the of the suitably qualified staff members who had already inspected the property. It was reasonable for the landlord to rely on the conclusions reached by the staff members who had visited the property and there is no evidence to suggest that their opinions were not correct or that a surveyor’s report would result in a different conclusion. The resident is entitled to arrange her own report by an independent surveyor if she wishes to. The landlord would be expected to consider such a report and explain if it changed its position regarding the draughts. However, the resident would be responsible for the cost of arranging a surveyor’s report.
17. While this Service has found no evidence of maladministration in how the landlord has responded to the matter, the landlord should have addressed the two repairs that were completed outside of its published target response time for an appointed repair in its complaint response. In line with its compensation policy detailed above, the landlord would have been expected to offer a discretionary compensation payment for failing to complete the two repairs within its published target time as it had with its acknowledged failure to escalate the complaint within its published target time (which is discussed in more detail below). As it failed to do so, this was a service failure by the landlord.
18. The Ombudsman’s own remedies guidance (which is available on our website) recommends a payment of £50 to £100 in cases of service failure of a short duration that may not have significantly affected the overall outcome. This includes distress and inconvenience, time and trouble, disappointment, loss of confidence, and delays in getting matters resolved. It would therefore be appropriate for the landlord to pay £100 to the resident in recognition of its failure to meet the 17 June 2022 deadline to complete its investigation beneath the floorboards (which was completed on 9 August 2022) and to undertake additional work to seal the air vents (which was completed on 25 August 2022).

The landlord’s complaint handling

19. The landlord acted ion line with its complaints process at stage one but it did not follow its complaints policy at stage two. The resident requested an escalation of the complaint on 27 September 2022 then received a stage two complaint response on 31 October 2022, five working days outside of its published target of 20 working days. While this delay was not significant. It was appropriate for the landlord to recognise the inconvenience it caused the resident, apologise and offer financial redress in line with its compensation policy detailed above.
20. The landlord’s £100 compensation offer is in line with this Service’s remedies guidance detailed above and therefore represents reasonable redress for this element of the complaint. The measures taken by the landlord to address what went wrong were proportionate to the impact that its failures had on the resident.

Determination

21. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in respect of how it handled the resident’s reports of draughts in the property.
22. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord made an offer of redress to the resident in respect of its complaint handling which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, satisfactorily resolves this element of the complaint.

Orders

23. For the service failure in not meeting its published timescales for appointed repairs, the landlord is ordered to pay to the resident £100. This is an addition to the compensation offered by the landlord previously through its complaints process. The payment should be made within four weeks of the date of this report. The landlord should update this Service when payment has been made.

Recommendations

24. As the Ombudsman’s finding of reasonable redress for its complaint handling was reached based on the landlord’s offer of £100 compensation, it is recommended that the landlord pays this to the resident if it has yet to do so.