London & Quadrant Housing Trust (L&Q) (202220652)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202220652

London & Quadrant Housing Trust

30 September 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 level of compensation awarded to the resident for the time taken to repair his boiler.
2. The Ombudsman has also considered complaint handling.

Background

3. The resident occupies a property under an assured tenancy which commenced on 29 December 2008. The property is a two-bedroom basement flat.
4. The resident first reported his boiler was not producing heating or hot water on 25 October 2022. Between 25 October 2022 and 6 January 2023, the resident reported his boiler was not working on 14 occasions. The landlord arranged 12 appointments during this time.
5. The resident explained to this service that the landlord changed and missed appointments, which delayed the boiler issues being resolved promptly. He also said that it was winter, and the landlord had not provided his household, which contains dependents, with any heaters.
6. The resident raised a formal complaint on 30 November 2022. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on the same day. It apologised for the issues with the resident’s heating and confirmed that an appointment had taken place already to fix the boiler. The resident remained dissatisfied and escalated his concerns with the intervention of this service.
7. The landlord issued its stage 2 response on 12 January 2023 and partly upheld the resident’s complaint. It apologised for missed appointments, not pre-agreeing appointments with the resident and incorrectly raising repair works with the wrong contractor. It also offered £230 in compensation. The resident felt the offer of compensation did not fully address the impact the landlord’s failures had on his household.
8. The boiler was fixed on 17 January 2023.

Assessment and findings

9. The landlord’s repairs policy (in clause 4.8) states that it will aim to complete routine repairs by arranging an appointment which is mutually agreeable between the landlord and the resident. It states that emergency works will be attended to within 24 hours.
10. It is also clear that the landlord dealt with the resident’s reports of no heating and hot water as a 72-hour repair, despite it being an emergency repair which should have been attended to within 24 hours based on the repairs policy.
11. The evidence shows that 3 appointments were missed and that the contractors did not attend at the scheduled time on at least 1 occasion. However, there were 3 occasions when the landlord was unable to gain access to the property. It is unclear whether those appointments had been pre-agreed with the resident as required by the policy.
12. The evidence also shows that some appointments had not been pre-agreed with the resident, contractors had missed appointments, and contractors had not attended the property at the time it had scheduled appointments. Often the resident had made special arrangements at work to accommodate the landlord in accessing the property for repairs.
13. The Ombudsman finds that the landlord unreasonably delayed in dealing with the matter and failed to comply with its own policies and procedures.
14. The landlord’s records show that although it did attend the property to fix the boiler, it was decided that the drains required unblocking to prevent the issues from reoccurring. It is clear from the evidence, that the landlord knew follow on works were required on 15 November 2022. However, they remained outstanding, not followed up on despite the resident’s continued reporting and the repeat findings of its gas engineers.
15. The Ombudsman finds that, on the balance of probabilities, had the landlord monitored the progress of the follow-on works, the boiler could have been fixed at a much earlier stage.
16. The boiler did not produce heating and hot water during the following periods:
    1. 25 October 2022 to 24 November 2022 (30 calendar days)
    2. 25 to 29 November 2022 (4 calendar days)
    3. 30 November 2022 to 21 December 2022 (21 calendar days)
    4. 6 to 17 January 2023 (11 calendar days)

This was a total of 66 calendar days.  

17. The landlord said it provided heaters to the resident on 5 December 2022. The resident denies this and said he had to borrow these from friends and family members. The landlord has not produced evidence to demonstrate that it did offer and provide heaters to the resident.
18. The resident was without heating and hot water and the delay in fixing the issue caused distress to the resident and his household during the winter period. The question for the Ombudsman is whether the landlord’s award of compensation was fair to recognise this.
19. The landlord offered the resident £230 compensation at stage 2 of its complaint procedure. This was broken down as follows:
    1. £50 for service failure
    2. £90 for distress and inconvenience
    3. £40 for missed appointments
    4. £50 for time and effort.

The landlord said if the resident accepted, the amount would be paid onto the rent account.

20. The Ombudsman has considered that:
    1. the household was without heating and hot water for 66 calendar days during the winter months and the landlord cannot show it provided temporary heaters
    2. the landlord failed to follow its repair policy with respect to the appointments
    3. the landlord failed to complete and monitor follow-up works which could have enabled the boiler to be fixed sooner
    4. the time and trouble of the resident in reporting and chasing the repair works
    5. the distress and inconvenience of the landlord’s failures on the resident.
21. The Ombudsman considers that the landlord’s offer of compensation and its apology do not fully address the failures and the impact of those failures experienced by the resident.

The landlord’s complaint handling

22. The landlord’s stage 1 response was issued on 2 December 2022. The response did not adhere to the requirements in the Complaint Handling Code (‘the Code’) for a stage 1 response. Clause 5.8 of the Code states it should:

confirm the following in writing to the resident:

1. the complaint stage
2. the complaint definition
3. the decision on the complaint
4. the reasons for any decisions made
5. the details of any remedy offered to put things right
6. details of any outstanding actions
7. details of how to escalate the matter to stage two if the resident is not satisfied with the answer

23. This is also detailed in clause 4.5 of its complaint policy. The response did not include any of these headings. The Ombudsman considers this to be a failure because it did not adhere to its own policy or the Code.
24. The complaint responses did not recognise that the repair was outstanding overall for 85 calendar days between 25 October 2022 and 17 January 2023 and that the resident was without heating and hot water for 66 of those days. This was nearly a 3-month delay during the winter totally months.

Determination

25. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, the Ombudsman finds service failure in the landlord’s offer of compensation following repairs to the boiler.
26. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, the Ombudsman finds there to be service failure with the landlord’s complaint handling.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

27. Within 28 days of this determination the Ombudsman orders the landlord to pay the resident £1000 compensation to fully recognise the impact of the failures set out above. This is an additional £770 compensation on top of what the landlord offered.
28. The landlord must pay the full £1000 directly to the resident, unless the resident agrees to have it paid onto the rent account.
29. The landlord must provide evidence that it has paid this to the resident. This evidence must be provided within 28 days of the date of this determination.