Plus Dane Housing Limited (202105871)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202105871

Plus Dane Housing Limited

27 June 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 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 anti-social behaviour (ASB) and noise disturbance by a neighbour.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord, living in a flat within a block of flats.
3. The resident was unhappy with noise disturbance from the flat above, which included shouting and screaming, a dog barking, and a child running late in the evening and into the early hours of the morning. She also raised concerns to the landlord about drinking and smoking in communal areas of the building.
4. The resident first reported concerns of ASB and noise nuisance in November 2020. In response to these reports, the landlord has issued warning letters to the neighbour, has requested the resident document the occurrences via diary sheets and its noise recording software, and has opened an ASB case to manage her reports.
5. The landlord’s stage one complaint response in July 2021, concluded that it could not consider her dissatisfaction with the handling of her reports of ASB and noise nuisance as a complaint as it was managing an active ASB case. It would continue to manage the case despite her having given notice to terminate her tenancy.
6. The resident escalated her complaint in July 2021 because she did not feel that it had taken fair action in response to her reports, and had been denied the chance of a fair resolution. She had also found its noise software difficult to use. To resolve her complaint, she wanted £1,000 compensation. The landlord’s final complaint response in September 2021 summarised the actions it had taken from her initial report of concerns over ASB and noise nuisance in November 2020. It concluded that it had taken fair action following her reports of ASB.
7. The resident subsequently referred her complaint to this Service. She remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s handling of her reports of ASB and noise nuisance. She felt that the landlord had used the Covid-19 restrictions to justify a lack of direct contact with the neighbour, failed to acknowledge her calls to the police, or confirm that it had reviewed the three recordings she had sent it. As a result, she felt ignored by the landlord, despite the “continuous pattern” of ASB which was impacting her physical and mental wellbeing.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

8. The resident has previously raised concerns over the effect of the ASB on her physical and mental health and wellbeing. The Ombudsman does not dispute her comments regarding her health, but we are unable to draw conclusions on the causation of, or liability for, impacts on health and wellbeing or to award damages for these. This is because we do not have the authority to do so in the way that a court, tribunal or liability insurer might. However, we have considered the general distress and inconvenience which the situation has caused her as well as the landlord’s response to the resident’s concerns about her health.
9. In recent correspondence to the Ombudsman, the resident has reported that there have been further incidents of noise and ASB after the landlord issued its final response to the complaint in September 2021. It is the Ombudsman’s role to investigate the landlord’s handling of the resident’s ASB reports and subsequent complaint through its complaints procedure. We cannot consider the landlord’s handling of recent incidents of ASB/noise in our investigation as the landlord needs to have the opportunity to respond to these reports before our Service becomes involved. If the resident is unhappy with the landlord’s response to her recent ASB reports she can raise a new complaint to the landlord. If she remains dissatisfied once she received the landlord’s final response to her new complaint, she may be able to refer the matter to the Ombudsman at that stage.

Policies and procedures

10. The landlord’s ASB policy sets out the steps the landlord will consider taking on receipt of ASB reports. These include speaking to the person reporting the ASB and agreeing an action plan with them, interviewing the alleged perpetrator, and gathering evidence. It will consider informal interventions first such as issuing warning letters to the alleged perpetrator. It will also consider whether a multi-agency approach is needed to deal with the ASB, involving the police and other local agencies. It may not consider occurrences with no pattern of behaviour or children playing to be ASB.
11. The landlord’s “compensation framework” document confirms that the landlord may offer a gesture of goodwill following a service failure which causes “exceptional inconvenience or distress”.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of ASB and noise disturbance

12. Following the resident’s reports of ASB and noise disturbance coming from the neighbour’s flat above in November 2020, the landlord was obligated to take action to seek to resolve the issue. It has evidenced that it largely did so, by issuing a letter to the neighbour in December 2020, and asking the resident to collect evidence of these instances by completing diary sheets and using its noise recording software.
13. The resident submitted recordings to the landlord in December 2020, including a call where the police had attended the neighbour’s property to resolve a domestic dispute between the neighbour and her daughter. The landlord has not evidenced that it had acknowledged these recordings, and it has also not evidenced that it had sought additional information from the police in relation to the incident at this time, although it did subsequently seek disclosure from the police for information about their involvement with the resident and the neighbour, it should have done this sooner in line with its ASB policy.
14. In correspondence with the Ombudsman, the resident has said she is unhappy that her 999 calls were not listened to by the landlord as part of the ASB investigation. She had asked for this to be done as the neighbour could be heard screaming in the background during one of these calls. The landlord would not be entitled to listen to 999 calls without permission from the police. The landlord acted reasonably by requesting disclosure of information from the police, although as above this should have been sooner. It is not likely that having the recording of the 999 call would have provided enough additional evidence for the landlord to take formal action against the neighbour for ASB as it would not have been clear from this call who was screaming, why they were screaming or whether this was a one off occurrence.
15. The resident has complained that she asked the landlord to do a welfare check on herself and all other residents in the block following her report that the neighbour had knocked on her door asking for money, shortly after moving in to the property. She is unhappy the landlord did not carry out welfare checks on all residents following her request.  As part of our investigation, The Ombudsman can only investigate the effect of the landlord’s actions or inaction on the resident and we cannot investigate or compensate for any distress and inconvenience caused to other residents. If other residents have been affected by the landlord’s handling of ASB in the building, they can raise their own complaints to the landlord about this. Therefore, we cannot investigate the resident’s concerns about welfare checks on other residents.
16. The landlord has not given a clear explanation in response to the resident’s concerns about welfare checks although it has said in its complaint responses that its service was impacted by the effects of covid19 restrictions. As part of this, many landlords had suspended face to face visits to tenants except in emergencies. Therefore, it is likely that the landlord would not have been in a position to carry out face to face welfare checks at the time. However, it could have attempted to call the resident to check she was alright after she reported this incident involving her neighbour. There is no evidence that the landlord attempted to call her and this has been taken into account as part of the Ombudsman’s overall assessment of compensation for distress and inconvenience.
17. The landlord subsequently opened an ASB case and agreed an action plan with the resident in March 2021. It had agreed to contact the neighbour to discuss her concerns, and has evidenced it had attempted to do so. As it was unable to make contact with the neighbour, it was reasonable for the landlord to instead liaise with the neighbour’s support worker, who had direct contact with the neighbour. The support worker subsequently confirmed that the neighbour disputed the concerns the resident had raised, which included there being a child and a dog in their property causing noise disturbance, and that they had thrown water over the balcony which had damaged the resident’s plants. It was reasonable for the landlord to request further evidence from the resident to continue to progress its ASB case, as it could not reasonably take formal action against the neighbour without having suitable evidence, in accordance with the landlord’s ASB policy.
18. The resident had reported some improvements during April to June 2021, although she still continued to report noise disturbance from a dog barking and a child playing in the neighbour’s property. However, the police were again called to the neighbour’s property following an assault on the neighbour by one of their guests in July 2021. The landlord has evidenced that it had liaised with the police in July 2021, to understand the nature of the incidents that they had attended the neighbour’s house and the police confirmed they would not be taking any further action at this time. Also in July 2021, the resident had also raised concerns over the behaviour of a guest of the neighbour. In response to these incidents, the landlord has evidenced that it had issued a formal warning letter to the neighbour, who had agreed not to allow the guest to return to the building. This was fair action for the landlord to take, and evidences it had managed the resident’s ASB case by liaising with the police to understand the nature of the reported incidents and taking more formal action against the neighbour to address the resident’s concerns about their behaviour.
19. The landlord confirmed in its final stage complaint response that it had agreed an action plan with the resident and asked her to record the further incidents, of which none were provided. Furthermore, it had worked closely with the neighbour’s support worker to try to improve matters and sought feedback from another neighbour, who had not heard or seen a child or dog coming in or out of the neighbour’s property. It had additionally issued warning letters to the neighbour and had requested information from the police to assist with its enquiries. Therefore, it concluded that it had acted in accordance with its ASB policy.
20. Although the landlord has evidenced that it took further steps by opening an ASB case in March 2021, this was some three months after the resident’s ASB reports started. Additionally, it had not acknowledged receipt of the evidence she had sent in December 2020. This added distress, inconvenience, time and trouble to the resident, and the landlord should offer compensation as detailed below for errors in its communication and delays in setting up an ASB case.
21. The resident has asked for £1,000 in compensation for her complaint. In assessing the appropriate level of compensation where service failure has been found, this Service has used the landlord’s own relevant policies and procedures, along with our own remedies guidance, to establish a suitable level of compensation.
22. It is this Service’s opinion that the amount of £200 compensation would provide adequate redress for the service failures identified and is in line with our Service’s remedies guidance (published on our website) as well as the landlord’s own compensation policy. The Ombudsman’s remedies guidance suggests awards of between £50 to £250 where there has been service failure which had an impact on the complainant but was of short duration and may not have significantly affected the overall outcome for the complainant. In this case, the delays and poor communication did not affect the outcome of the complaint as the landlord has evidenced that it had taken action by issuing a warning letter to the neighbour, prior to it ultimately agreeing an action plan with the resident to manage the case. Although it had honoured the agreement detailed in the action plan, its errors did have an impact on the resident and compensation is due in view of this.

Determination

23. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in respect of its handling of the resident’s  reports of anti-social behaviour (ASB) and noise disturbance.

Orders

24. The Ombudsman orders the landlord to pay the resident total compensation of £200 within four weeks for its delay in raising an ASB case, and its poor communication in respect to the evidence having been received and reviewed.

Recommendations

25. It is recommended that the landlord review its staff’s training needs in relation to their application of its policies and procedures with regard to ASB complaints and compensation, to seek to prevent a recurrence of its above failures in the resident’s case. This should include consideration of this Service’s guidance on remedies, published on our website and the completion of our free online dispute resolution training for landlords, if this has not been done recently.