Leeds City Council (202116049)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202116049

Leeds City Council

19 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 is about the landlord’s handling of damp and mould within the property and associated works.

Background

2. The resident lives in a two-bedroom maisonette, under a secure tenancy agreement with the landlord, who are a local authority. The tenancy began on 11 August 2014. The resident lives with his wife and three children.
3. The resident has been experiencing issues with damp and mould since the start of his tenancy, which he has been reporting to the landlord. The resident says that the landlord had completed some repairs in the past, but the problem persists. The resident says that the damp and mould has affected a number of items and personal belongings which he has had to dispose of.
4. The resident reported issues with damp and mould in his kitchen to the landlord in July 2020. He further raised an issue with damp and mould in his bedroom in November 2020 and an inspection took place later that month. Repairs were raised for the kitchen, but the landlord was unable to inspect the damp within the bedroom due to belongings being stored within the cupboard.
5. The resident raised a stage one complaint on 13 April 2021 because the work had not been completed, despite calling the landlord for an update. The landlord responded on 5 May 2021 and said that the inspection had identified further works required, which had been raised and would be prioritised.
6. The resident contacted this Service to assist with escalating his complaint on 13 October 2021 as he was unhappy with the landlord’s response. The resident said that the works not been completed and that he was concerned about the damp and mould effecting the health of his young children. This Service contacted the landlord on 29 October 2021. The landlord provided a stage two response on 22 November 2021 and stated that:
   1. Damp and mould were first reported in July 2020, but due to Covid-19, the initial inspection was delayed until November 2020.
   2. Repairs were raised and given to a subcontractor, which were due to take place the week commencing 3 January 2021, and it would contact the resident if there was any earlier appointment.
   3. Previous damp and mould repairs had been completed, but the issue was made worse due to overcrowding in the property and condensation. Further advice was given on how to prevent condensation.
   4. Finally, the landlord would speak to the housing management team and see if it could provide additional support with regards to moving properties.
7. On 3 February 2022, the resident contacted this Service to confirm that he remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s response, as it had not been in contact with him to complete the repairs.
8. The resident has since confirmed to this Service that the landlord has completed the repairs, but there are some issues with the quality of the works, and that the issue with damp and mould is still not resolved.

Assessment and findings

9. The Ombudsman’s role is to determine complaints by reference to what is fair in all the circumstances and decide if the landlord is responsible for maladministration or service failure. When investigating a complaint, the Ombudsman applies its dispute resolution principles. These are high level good practice guidance developed from the Ombudsman’s experience of resolving disputes, for use by everyone involved in the complaints process. There are only three principles driving effective dispute resolution:
   1. Be fair – treat people fairly and follow fair processes.
   2. Put things right.
   3. Learn from outcomes.

Policy and procedure

10. The Housing Act 2004 ensures landlords are responsible for assessing hazards and risks within its rented homes. When assessing any such hazards and risks, the assessment should be considered in line with the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS). Damp and mould growth are potential hazards that may require remedy.
11. The landlord’s repair and maintenance handbook (dated March 2014) states that repairs fall into three categories:
    1. Emergency repairs – Urgent action is required to prevent a serious risk to health and safety, major damage to the structure of the property or results in the property being insecure. It commits to attend within three hours and aims to complete an emergency repair within 24 hours.
    2. Priority repairs – Repairs which seriously affect comfort or cause damage to the property. It commits to complete the repair within either three or seven days.
    3. General repairs – Other repairs that need to be done to a property. It commits to complete the repair within seven working days.
12. The handbook also states that other repairs, such as damp proofing works, are classed as batched repairs and it commits to complete the repair within 60 days.
13. In response to Covid 19, the landlord also produced guidance for its staff about how to identify essential and non-essential repairs. Under the heading, damp and mould, the guidance said:
    1. All reports will be triaged to determine severity, need for physical assessment and any self-help measures that can be implemented.
    2. A specific team within Property Management will carry out the triage function making use of video calling where available as an alternative means to physical assessment.
    3. The need for any remedial repairs will be determined on a case-by-case basis and will be predominantly restricted to removing any serious cases of mould growth that cannot be dealt with by the tenant and if left is likely to be prejudicial to health.
14. The landlord says that it does not have a separate compensation policy, but if following a complaint investigation, faults have been identified during the investigation and it is felt that compensation is an appropriate avenue in order to resolve the complaint, then an offer may be made.

The landlord’s handling of damp and mould within the property and associated works

15. After reviewing the information sent to this Service, it is clear that the resident’s home has been subject to issues with damp and mould since 2014, with at least 16 separate repairs being logged for damp and condensation painting between October 2014 and October 2018.
16. The repairs log further confirms that the resident reported an issue with damp in his kitchen, which had also damaged the kitchen unit, on 23 July 2020. The resident chased up the landlord on 16 November 2020, also reporting that he had severe damp and mould on an external wall in his bedroom which resulted in him having to throw away clothes.
17. The landlord attended on 23 November 2020 to carry out an inspection of the property, although it was unable to assess the damp and mould in the bedroom cupboard due to the number of belongings being stored within it. The landlord raised an order to remove the corner kitchen base unit beneath the sink, and report back the condition of the wall behind. The repair log shows that this repair was raised again in January and May 2021 and not completed until 14 July 2021. Further works were identified, but not completed until 17 February 2022.
18. No information has been provided to show that the landlord returned to resident’s home to address the issues of damp and mould within the bedroom, but the resident has since informed this Service that further works were completed but had not resolved the issue.
19. In line with the HHSRS guidance, damp and mould is a potential hazard, and as such, this Service would have expected to see records that demonstrated the landlord contacted the resident to determine the severity of the issue and provide advice accordingly. No records have been provided to show this and therefore, the landlord failed to follow the HHSRS guidance and its own revised Covid 19 guidance.
20. Following the resident’s second report of damp and mould in November 2020, the landlord did attend the property within a reasonable timeframe. Although a repair was logged to remove the corner base unit in the kitchen, the information provided by the landlord does not indicate the severity of the damp and mould identified. There is also no indication that the landlord provided the resident with any advice or information on how to treat the damp and mould.
21. Despite a repair being raised in November 2020, the works were not completed correctly, and it took for the resident to raise a formal complaint in April 2021 for the landlord to take any action.
22. Furthermore, it took until the resident escalated the complaint, via this Service, in February 2022 for the works to be completed. This was a total of 402 working days from when the resident reported damp and mould in July 2020 until the works were completed. Significantly, there is no indication that, at any time during this period, that the landlord took any steps to investigate and address the cause of the damp and mould identified, it simply waited for the resident to keep reporting his concerns.
23. The Ombudsman’s damp and mould spotlight report provides further insight into how this Service expects from landlords to act in these circumstances:
    1. Landlords should ensure that their responses to reports of damp and mould are timely and reflect the urgency of the issue.
    2. Landlords should review the number of missed appointments in relation to damp and mould cases and, depending on the outcome of any review, consider what steps may be required to reduce them.
    3. Landlords must ensure there is effective internal communication between their teams and departments and ensure that one individual or team has overall responsibility for ensuring complaints or reports are resolved, including follow up or aftercare.
24. Whilst this Service acknowledges that residents may have experienced delays because of Covid19, this was an unreasonable amount of time to elapse between the works being identified and completed. This amounted to maladministration which was further exacerbated as the landlord was aware of the historical reports of damp and mould.
25. Information provided shows that the resident informed the landlord in November 2020, that the damp and mould was causing a bad smell within his home and that he was concerned that it may have an impact on his young children’s health. He further reported that the damp and mould had affected some of the family’s clothing, and they had to be thrown away. Furthermore, in April 2021, the landlord was informed, via an MP complaint, that the damp and mould was having an impact on his child’s skin condition.
26. Within the landlord’s final response, the landlord acknowledged that there was a delay in undertaking the repair work and apologised. However, the landlord did not acknowledge its failure to follow its own policy and procedures or provide any acknowledgement/redress for items which the resident says were damaged because of the damp and mould. As such, it has not taken sufficient action to ‘put things right’ for the resident. Neither had it detailed how it has ‘learned from outcomes’ and what steps it has taken to prevent a recurrence of the failings.
27. The Ombudsman draws the landlord’s attention to section six of the Housing Ombudsman Complaint Handling Code, which sets out what the Ombudsman considers are the best practice principles of “putting things right” where there have been failings. This includes the principle that any remedy offered by a landlord “must reflect the extent of any service failures and the level of detriment caused to the resident”. Therefore, the decision to not award compensation in recognition of its failings was not reasonable.
28. In assessing an appropriate level of compensation, the Ombudsman takes into account a range of factors including any distress and inconvenience caused by the issues, the amount of time and effort expended on pursuing the matter with the landlord, and the level of detriment caused by the landlord’s acts and/or omissions. It considers whether any redress is proportionate to the severity of the failing by the landlord and the impact on the resident. The Ombudsman also takes into account the evidence that has been provided.
29. Ultimately the Ombudsman considers what would be fair and proportionate. The aim of compensation is not to be punitive, but to provide redress for the impact of any failings by the landlord on the resident. In the case of compensation for distress and inconvenience, we are not able to quantify a definitive loss and the intention of such an award is to recognise the overall distress and inconvenience suffered by the resident.
30. The Ombudsman has first considered the distress and inconvenience suffered by the resident as a result of the landlord’s failure to attend to the repair in a reasonable timeframe. In line with the Ombudsman’s remedy guidance where there has been a failure which had a significant impact on the resident, a payment of between £600 and £1000 is recommended. The landlord knew that the repairs would reduce the likelihood of the resident experiencing damp and mould living conditions, and therefore should have taken steps to ensure these were completed in a reasonable timeframe. In recognition of this, the Ombudsman has made an order for the landlord to pay the resident £600 compensation.
31. In relation to the items damaged due to damp and mould, the resident provided the landlord with pictures of the belongings that had been affected by damp and mould, which the landlord did not acknowledge. Where the Ombudsman is satisfied that, on the balance of probabilities, a resident has incurred costs but it is not possible to provide a reasonable estimate, the Ombudsman can make an order that a landlord should pay an amount in recognition of the fact that the resident has incurred costs that would not have arisen had the maladministration not occurred.
32. Furthermore, if maladministration has been identified, the Ombudsman can also make an order for the landlord to pay compensation in recognition of the resulting distress and inconvenience caused to the resident. Although it is not clear if all the items were stored in the affected areas, it is clear from the photos that the affected items would have needed to have been disposed of due to damp and mould. In recognition of this, the Ombudsman has made an order for the landlord to pay the resident £200 compensation.
33. The Ombudsman must also consider whether compensation based on rent is appropriate. The resident was unable to make full use of his property due to the damp and mould within the kitchen and bedroom cupboards. The Ombudsman considers that a 10% rent rebate is appropriate for 82 weeks. The calculation has been used based on the average social rent for Yorkshire and the Humber in 2020/21, of £74.95 (rounded up to £75 for ease). An order has been made for the landlord to pay the resident a total of £922.50.
34. In summary, a finding of severe maladministration has been made as the landlord failed to address the residents report of damp and mould in a reasonable timeframe. The landlord was aware of the resident’s concerns and the impact the damp and mould was having on his family.

Determination

35. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was severe maladministration in the landlord’s handling of damp and mould.

Orders

36. The landlord is ordered:
    1. To pay the resident a total of £1,622.50 within four weeks of the date of this report for reasons identified above.
    2. Attend the property and carry out an assessment of any damp and mould. This inspection should be documented fully, along with the reason for any decision made, and a copy provided to the Ombudsman.
    3. Any works that are identified as required should be carried out within one month of the date of the inspection.