Plus Dane Housing Limited (202225094)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202225094

Plus Dane Housing Limited

28 March 2024

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

The complaint concerns the landlord’s handling of:
1. The resident’s request for a wet room adaptation at the property.
2. The resident’s request to make a complaint.

Background and summary of events

Background

The resident has an assured tenancy which began in October 2010. The property is a two–bedroom house.
The landlord’s complaints policy defines a complaint as “an expression of dissatisfaction, however made, about the standard of service, actions or lack of action by us, our staff, or those acting on our behalf, affecting an individual resident or group of residents”. It adds that “customers do not have to use the word complaint for it to be treated as such”.
The landlord has a two-stage complaint process. It will acknowledge a complaint within five working days. At stage 1 it will provide its decision in writing within 10 working says. The resident can escalate the complaint to stage two “if the complaint is not resolved satisfactorily”. At stage 2 it will respond within 20 working days.
The landlord’s compensation framework states that where “as a result of service failure or inaction” it may make a discretionary payment to the resident.
The compensation framework states payments made following service failure “should be considered taking into account the level of impact that they have on a customer and the length of time that the issue has been ongoing”. In terms of impact the framework defines these as:
1. Low impact- where the resident suffered “minimal detriment”.
2. Medium impact- “where there has been some inconvenience or distress” to the resident due to the service being below the level the landlord should be delivering.
3. High impact- “where there has been significant inconvenience or distress” to the resident “through poor service or by a persistent failure leading to significant delay”.
The landlord’s adaptations policy sets out that it is “committed to supporting the wellbeing needs of our customers who are experiencing difficulty living in their home due to age or disability”. It notes that “the statutory responsibility for the funding of adaptations is the duty of the Local Authority” and that the landlord would contribute towards adaptation requests up to a maximum of £15,000.
In terms of adaptations which cost up to £1,000 these were considered by the landlord to be minor adaptations and requests for these could be made direct to the landlord’s customer access team. Examples given of minor adaptations included grab rails and level taps.
The adaptations policy set out that for major adaptations (which were those costing between £1,000 and £30,000), 50% would be funded by a disabled facilities grant from the Local Authority (LA). Examples given of major adaptations included a level access shower. The policy added that major adaptations required a formal written assessment from an occupational therapist (OT).
In terms of timescales the adaptions policy set out that the landlord would aim to complete major adaptations within six months of receiving grant approval from the LA. It added that major adaptations would be “placed onto a waiting list which will be managed in date order”.

Summary of Events

The resident contacted the landlord in April 2021 to discuss her request for a wet room adaptation to the property. The landlord has been unable to provide further details of when this discussion had taken place or of any actions that it took following this.
The resident contacted the landlord on 22 June 2022 about the adaptation application, and explained that the wet room had been approved prior to the COVID–19 pandemic.
The landlord’s internal correspondence from 22 June 2022 show it attempted to find the resident’s application. As it was unable to locate any application on its system it emailed the LA about the matter.
The LA’s internal correspondence on 23 June 2022 set out that it had obtained the resident’s adaptation request. It explained it had tried to contact the OT who had carried out an assessment in December 2018 directly, however she was unavailable. The email explained that the relevant “work tray was not notified”. As a result it had been unable to carry out the relevant checks before passing the matter to the landlord as per its normal procedure. It agreed, because of this, that it would forward the matter straight to the landlord as opposed to continuing with its normal process.
The LA emailed the landlord on 23 June 2022 to ask if the landlord could place the adaptation request in the appropriate place on its waiting list. It confirmed to the landlord the reasons why the request had been delayed at its end. The LA however noted the OT had mentioned that she had contacted the landlord directly via emails at various times since the application was made over the adaptation request. The landlord has been unable to provide any details of any contact in the intervening period from the OT.
The landlord contacted its approved contractor dealing with level access showers and wet rooms on 17 August 2022 asking it to undertake a survey and to provide plans and a quote for the work. The landlord has explained this would have required the contractor to contact the resident to gain access to the property.
The landlord’s contractor emailed the landlord on 27 October 2022 providing the plan and quotation for the work to make the necessary adaption to the bathroom.
The landlord emailed the quotation and plans to the LA on 2 November 2022.
The resident called the landlord on 4 January 2023 to make a complaint. The landlord’s notes of the call explained the resident had been waiting a number of years for the wet room to be installed and the resident had been unable to use the bath and was struggling to use the facilities. The resident noted that she had spoken to the LA who had informed her that it had sent everything to the landlord. She added that she could not wait any longer for the adaptation to be done and that she wanted a say in how it looked. This was something that the LA had informed her she could do if she was paying the difference.
The landlord’s internal communication on 13 January 2023 noted that it had returned the plans and costs to the LA for approval in early November 2022. It added that it would chase the matter and that it would then look to prioritise the work and aim to complete it in six months once it had been approved.
The landlord called the resident back on 13 January 2023 to set out its response. It stated that if the resident “remained dissatisfied with the timescales following the work being completed she could submit a complaint”. It followed up the call with an email which explained:
1. It had spoken to the team leader who had been dealing with the matter and had confirmed that, following the resident’s contact on 22 June 2022, it had contacted the LA to help progress the matter.
2. It had replied to the LA with the plans and costs on 2 November 2022. It added that as per its adaptations policy it needed to wait for approval of the funding from the LA to start the work. It added once the approval was received it would do its “best to prioritise the adaptation for you”.
3. The landlord had also discussed the resident contacting the LA to progress the approval.
4. The landlord was unable to progress the resident’s concerns as a complaint at that time. It stated this was “as the matter is ongoing and we are relying on a third party”. It informed the resident she could contact the Housing Ombudsman “for advice, support and assistance with your complaint”.
The landlord emailed the LA on 13 January 2023 to chase the approval for the adaptation. The LA emailed the landlord on 29 March 2023 to approve the adaptation to the resident’s home.
The landlord sent an email to its specialist asbestos contractor on 11 April 2023 to undertake a pre-work survey. This was completed on 9 May 2023.
The landlord carried out the wet room adaptation to the bathroom in June 2023.
The landlord emailed the resident on 8 February 2024. It explained that following her having contacted the Housing Ombudsman about the bathroom adaptation it had taken the decision to re-investigate her concerns at stage 1 of its complaints process. It explained it would provide its response by 15 February 2024. It set out the resident’s complaint as being:
1. About her request for adaptations to the bathroom and how it had handled her concerns in January 2023 when she had attempted to make a complaint.
2. That the resident had been awarded a disabled facilities grant in 2018 to fund the adaptation. Since this time, her disability had become more severe and she was unhappy with the delays as the adaptation had not been completed at that time.
The landlord wrote to the resident on 15 February 2024 with its stage 1 response. It explained, following the Housing Ombudsman’s request for its evidence concerning her complaint in January 2023, it had decided to provide a formal response. The landlord explained that it understood the resident had been informed by the LA when she had contacted it about the adaptation request that everything had been returned to the landlord. It explained:
1. When the resident contacted it in January 2023 it had accepted that the delay to the adaptation request had been “unreasonable and unacceptable”. However this had been due to the LA and not the landlord.
2. All requests for adaptations had to be recommended by an OT in writing. In line with its adaptation policy it had to receive formal confirmation of how the adaptation was to be funded. It understood this to be a DFG which was the duty of the LA and not it. The landlord added that it had a joint funding agreement in place where it would match up to 50% of major work requests up to a total contribution of £15,000.
3. In this case the LA had received a request for an adaptation on 20 August 2018. The OT had completed her assessment on 24 December 2018.
4. The timeline of events from the point that the resident had contacted it via the team who was providing the weekly support to her in April 2021 up to when the wet room had been installed in June 2023. It added that the installation had been within six months of it receiving the approval of the funding in line with the timescale in its adaptations policy and that it had prioritised the work due to the previous delay experienced by the resident.
5. It was partially upholding the complaint as it accepted there had been an eight-week timescale for it to complete the feasibility checks. It also wanted to apologise for not accepting the complaint in January 2023. It had attempted to progress the matter by contacting the LA. However on reflection it stated it could have investigated the complaint. The landlord made an offer of £75 which it set out was for the delay in processing the request between June 2022 and August 2022.
6. It had made recommendations and learned lessons from the case to ensure a similar issue was not repeated. This included reviewing its adaptations policy and looking at whether there was anything further it could do to progress cases with third parties especially if there had been significant delays.

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for the wet room adaptation.

The resident has stated that she had been in receipt of approval of the adaptation prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and that the landlord had delayed the installation of the wet room. Whilst the evidence provided does show that she had an OT assessment in December 2018, this assessment would have then been passed at that time to the LA and not the landlord, as the LA had “statutory responsibility for the funding of adaptations”. Once the LA had approved it and subject to an annual budget allocation the landlord would then be able to offer the adaptations to its resident. This framework was set out in the landlord’s adaptations policy.
There is no evidence to show at what point prior to April 2021 the resident had, either directly or via her OT, approached the landlord about the adaptation. Whilst the Ombudsman has noted the resident’s account, due to this, this Ser vice has focused the investigation of events from April 2021 onwards.
The landlord has accepted that the resident had contacted it in April 2021 in terms of the wet room adaptation. However it has been unable to provide further details of the resident’s contact at that time. It has suggested that the contact had been made via the weekly support network which it had been providing at the time to the resident. It has cited that the contact would have been during the period that there were national lockdowns in place because of the COVID-19 pandemic and that as a result it had made changes to the way it had delivered services.
Whilst the pandemic and lockdowns had affected landlords and impacted on the delivery of services, the landlord should have had in place a system for noting down the resident’s contact so that it could make further enquiries about the matter. However it did not do this and this was a missed opportunity to proactively address its resident’s needs, particularly as she needed the work to allow her to properly use her bathroom. Whilst the resident has stated that she understood that the whole process could take 18 months to be approved, this timescale was unduly extended due to the landlord not making further enquiries with the LA at the time. This caused the resident a degree of distress and inconvenience, compounded as she was struggling to use the bathroom without the adaptation.
The resident has explained that her OT had contacted the landlord on several occasions about the adaptation. Whilst the Ombudsman has noted the resident’s account neither party has provided any further evidence about when these contacts had taken place or what the landlord had told the resident via the OT concerning the approval of the adaptation. The Ombudsman cannot say with reasonable confidence based on the available evidence, what contact there was between the landlord and the OT.
Upon being contacted directly by the resident on 22 June 2022 the landlord’s initial actions were reasonable. As it was unable to locate details of the resident’s application it contacted the LA who had accepted that it had not processed this due to a system error on its part. The LA then agreed, due to the delay, to forgo its normal process and to pass the matter back to the landlord to progress. It asked the landlord to “place this in the appropriate date in your waiting list” which the landlord agreed to do. This was appropriate as it aimed to minimise any further delay that the resident had been experiencing.
The landlord has accepted that, whilst it had agreed to process the resident’s application, it did not complete its feasibility checks until 17 August 2022, some two months later. It has accepted this was a delay on its part and that, whilst it had a large number of other cases it was progressing, this was not in keeping with its aims and standards. Although it has recently offered £75 compensation for its failings, the award proposed is not in keeping with its compensation framework and is not proportionate to reflect the impact to the resident.
The landlord has explained that following the feasibility checks being completed, it instructed its contractor on 17 August 2022 to complete a survey and draw up plans. This was completed on 27 October 2022 which it considers was a reasonable timescale. The landlord explained that its contractor needed to gain access to the resident’s property to undertake the survey and complete the plans. It has however not provided details of when its contractor had attended the property or whether there was a delay in it being able to do so. As the contractor was acting on behalf of the landlord, the landlord should have taken the opportunity to manage the issue to ensure that any visit occurred as soon as possible to enable it to forward the plans to the LA for approval promptly There is no evidence that it did this and this was another missed opportunity by the landlord.
The landlord acted promptly once it was provided with the plans from its contractor in forwarding these to the LA for approval. The landlord has provided evidence that it chased the LA over the matter when the resident had contacted it in January 2023. However it has not been able to provide this Service with any evidence that it had been chasing the matter between November 2022 and January 2023 and again after the single email which it sent in January 2023. Whilst it is accepted that the adaptation approval was at the time in the remit of the LA and not the landlord, as the resident had a disability the landlord should have done more to proactively chase up on the matter.
Following the approval from the LA the landlord did comply with the timescale of six months as set out in its adaptations policy in installing and completing the wet room by the end of June 2023.
Overall, whilst the landlord, at times, did act reasonably in dealing with the adaptation and for some of the time the issue was not being dealt with by it but rather the LA, there were occurrences where it delayed in dealing with the matter. Taken altogether these failings amount to maladministration and the Ombudsman has ordered compensation of £300 for the issue.

The landlord’s handling of the resident’s request to make a complaint.

Since making her original complaint in January 2023, the resident contacted the Housing Ombudsman Service in line with the email from the landlord on 13 January 2023. This was on the basis that the landlord informed her that it would not at that time treat her concerns as a complaint.
Following the Housing Ombudsman having requested evidence from the landlord to investigate the complaint, the landlord stated it would revisit the case and investigate it in line with stage 1 of its complaints process. The stage 1 response was issued to the resident on 15 February 2024. The response explained that if the resident remained dissatisfied she could escalate the complaint to stage 2 of the complaints process. Whilst the resident did not do this, the Ombudsman has decided to investigate this case, as the time it was originally referred to us, we considered that it had exhausted the landlord’s complaint process.
This is because after carefully considering all the evidence, whilst the landlord did not treat the resident contacting it in January 2023 as a complaint, this had been the purpose of her contact at that time and it was not appropriate for the landlord to wait until February 2024 to investigate the matter.
The landlord’s complaints policy sets out that the resident was not required to use the word complaint to make a complaint and that it should have treated any dissatisfaction as a complaint. However in this case the landlord’s contemporaneous call notes from 4 January 2023 show that the resident had used the word complaint in expressing her feedback about the delay. The landlord should therefore have treated the matter as a complaint and progressed the matter in line with its complaints policy. It did not do so, neither did it acknowledge the resident’s contact in keeping with the timescales in its complaints policy. Whilst the landlord’s notes show an internal discussion about the matter had taken place on 11 January 2023, at which point it was looking to see if there had been any delays at its end rather than with the LA a decision to not progress the resident’s contact as a complaint was not made until 13 January 2023, some seven working days later.
The landlord has explained that it had informed the resident during a call on 13 January 2023 that it would not be dealing with the matter as a complaint but “if she remains dissatisfied with the timescales following the work being completed she can submit a complaint”. Whilst it had followed up the call with an email which set out details of the conversation it had with the resident; this email made no mention of her being able to make a complaint after the work was completed.
The landlord has explained in its recent stage 1 response from 15 February 2024 that it had tried to progress the case rather than setting up a complaint for the resident. This suggests that the landlord was of the view that it was unable to do both aspects at the same time. This was a missed opportunity and whilst the landlord should be acknowledged for having recently re-investigated the matter and now dealt with it as a complaint in line with its complaint policy, the delay of over 13 months would have caused the resident a significant amount of distress and inconvenience and frustration at being told by both the LA and the landlord that the other party was at fault for the delay in approving and installing the adaptation. This was a failing by the landlord and the Ombudsman has ordered compensation of £100 for this service failure.

Determination (decision)

In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman’s Scheme, there was maladministration in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for a wet room adaptation at the property.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman’s Scheme, there was service failure in the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request to make a complaint.

Reasons

Whilst there were periods during which the progress of the wet room adaptation was outside of the control of the landlord, there were delays caused by the landlord when the responsibility rested with it. It has also not been able to evidence that it had followed up with the matter when the resident had raised the issue with it in April 2021 until further contact occurred some 14 months later. These all contributed to a delay in the time taken for the wet room to eventually be installed at the property, which impacted the resident as the adaptation was in respect of her disability.
The landlord failed to deal with the resident’s complaint in January 2023 when she had specifically called to make a complaint. It did however review the complaint in 2024 and accepted it could have progressed the matter through its internal complaints process the previous year.

Orders

Within the next four weeks the Ombudsman orders the landlord to:
1. Arrange for a member of the landlord’s staff to apologise to the resident for the failings identified in this report.
2. Pay the resident an amount of £400. This replaces the amount recently offered of £75 following its stage 1 response in February 2024. This amount comprises:
  1. £300 for the distress and inconvenience caused by the delays in handling and chasing up the resident’s wet room adaptation request.
  2. £100 for its failure to set up a complaint when requested by the resident in January 2023.
3. Provide the Ombudsman with written details of how it will proactively chase cases/liaise with third parties to ensure that any delays to residents are minimised.