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Birmingham City Council (202011984)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202011984

Birmingham City Council

24 August 2021


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 blocked toilets.

Background and summary of events

  1. The resident is a tenant of the landlord. She has two toilets in her home.
  2. The landlord’s records show that the resident reported a blocked toilet on 15 January 2021.  A contractor “attended property to investigate blockage- found no blockage on site found toilet to constantly pumping water into pan- recommend emergency plumber to attend to rectify cistern”. The records state that the repair job was completed on 18 January, but do not give any specific details of what work was done.
  3. The resident raised a formal complaint to the landlord on 27 January 2021. She said the contractor who attended on 15 January did not enter her home. The contractor had advised that a drainage specialist would attend for a follow up appointment. She said she called multiple times to chase the appointment, but nobody attended until 18 January. The resident indicated that prior to 15 January she had reported that her downstairs toilet was not working. She said the landlord did not treat it as a priority repair. She said neither toilet was working on 15 January. The landlord’s records show the resident also advised as part of her complaint that because both toilets were blocked “she was forced to have the repairs attended privately”. She was dissatisfied that the landlord had not offered her temporary toilet facilities.
  4. The landlord issued its stage one complaint response on 2 March 2021. It said it had spoken to the contractor. He said he had entered the property, and noted that the upstairs toilet was blocked, but the downstairs one was not. It said the resident had since confirmed that her friend had repaired her toilet. It concluded by explaining how the resident could escalate her complaint if she remained dissatisfied.
  5. The resident escalated her complaint on 3 March 2021. She disputed that the contractor had entered her home. She asked the landlord what its process was for ensuring work was completed, and how it could be sure the contractor had told the truth. She asked the landlord why she would have called it multiple times after the contractor had attended on 15 January, if he “had done his job correctly”. She said the contractor did not enter her home so was unable to assess either toilet.
  6. The landlord issued its final complaint response on 26 March 2021. It reiterated that contractor had confirmed he entered the property and inspected both toilets. It said the contractor did not offer temporary toilet facilities as one toilet was still working. It said it had been difficult to investigate her concerns as both parties had provided opposite accounts and so it was hard to ascertain the truth. It apologised for any misunderstanding and inconvenience caused from the situation. It concluded by explaining how the resident could refer her complaint to this Service if she remained dissatisfied.

Assessment and findings

  1. Both the landlord and the resident have very different accounts of how the repair visit on 15 January 2021 proceeded. The repair records, brief as they are, support the landlord’s explanation and response to the issue. The resident has provided a detailed account of what she experienced and her actions in light of it. Brief repair records are not unusual, and no robust and independent evidence has been provided for this investigation which might allow us to determine reliably which of the accounts was the more accurate. Because of that, this investigation centres on the landlord’s repair actions, rather than on what may have occurred during the visit.
  2. The landlord’s repairs policy confirms that it is responsible for repairs to toilets, and flushing systems. It will attend to emergency repairs (ones which could cause a danger of injury, or damage to the property) within two hours. It will attend to urgent repairs (ones which protect the safety of the resident, or the security of the property) within one, three, or seven working days depending on the issue. 
  3. Local authority landlords, such as in this case, have a right to repair scheme which sets out timeframes for a landlord to respond to a repair issue. The scheme lists repairs to toilets (where there is only one in the property) as having a response time of one working day.
  4. The resident told the landlord in her complaint that both toilets in her home were not working, and that she arranged for the repairs herself. The date of that repair is not known.
  5. The landlord has provided extracts of its repair records for this investigation. These show the resident reported a blocked toilet on 15 January 2021. It investigated, recommended an emergency plumber, and completed works on 18 January. No evidence has been provided of the resident making further reports about the toilets to the landlord. That may be because the resident made the arrangements to repair them herself, or because the repairs were completed as indicated in the records. In any case, the completion date of 18 January 2021 (Monday) was within one working day of the original report the previous Friday. The landlord therefore met its repair timeframes for this type of issue.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration in respect of the complaint.

Reasons

  1. The toilet repairs were attended to and resolved within the relevant repair timeframes.