Metropolitan Housing Trust Limited (202106201)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202106201

Metropolitan Housing Trust Limited

25 March 2022

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:
   1. Refurbishment works to the resident’s kitchen and alterations to the bathroom.
   2. The associated complaint.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord. The property is a maisonette.
3. During November 2020, the resident discussed refurbishment works to her kitchen with the landlord’s contractors. A plan was drawn up and it was agreed that the contractor would return with the completed plan and samples of flooring for the resident to approve. It was agreed that the downstairs bathroom would be altered and a sample was taken from the bathroom ceiling to test for asbestos. The resident raised concern with the landlord in January 2021 as she had been told that the work was due to commence on 27 January 2021 despite no plan being agreed. She raised a complaint to the landlord regarding this on 28 January 2021 as she had not received a response to her previous emails and contractors had shown up that day unannounced to begin works.
4. In response to the complaint, the landlord confirmed that the kitchen had been ordered following communication with its contractors and the resident, who had since agreed the plans. It upheld the complaint based on the miscommunication that had occurred and offered £25 compensation for the resident’s time and trouble, which she accepted. It also arranged to visit the property on 11 February 2021 to discuss the works in view of the previous miscommunication.
5. The refurbishment works began on 22 March 2021. The resident then asked for a complaint to be raised as she was dissatisfied with the quality of work undertaken by the contractors and the time and trouble she had spent rectifying mistakes that had been made. Her concerns included being told that it was her responsibility to disconnect appliances, the late start and end times of the contractors each day, an incorrectly fitted cistern, a dispute over whether a new electrical circuit was needed in the kitchen and the contractors’ assertion that they were due to replace the bathroom which was not the case. She also complained about the removal of her bathroom flooring unnecessarily, her kitchen wastepipe being fitted incorrectly uphill, the water being turned off without any prior notice, her sink being left disconnected until she had raised concerns with the landlord, the contractors handling of a leak in her bathroom and the overall lack of management by the landlord which meant that she and her husband needed to rectify mistakes made. She asked to be notified of the works due to take place each day, moving forward.
6. The landlord acknowledged the resident’s concerns as a stage two escalation request. It discussed the concerns raised with the resident and apologised that works had not gone to plan and for any inconvenience caused. It detailed a list of works to be completed and confirmed that a member of staff would attend to discuss the works with the contractors. Following this, the resident continued to report that an electrical wire had been cut by the contractors and she had needed to call an out of hours contractor to repair this as she had smelled burning. Further conversations were held regarding the flooring in the resident’s bathroom and it was agreed that a flooring of the resident’s choice would be purchased by the landlord.
7. In its stage two complaint response on 12 April 2021, the landlord explained that it was not always able to control inconveniences caused by refurbishment works and could not find any evidence of service failure in the handling of the works. It confirmed that the incorrectly fitted cistern and the dispute over the electrics in the kitchen had been resolved. It apologised that the resident was told that it would be her responsibility to disconnect appliances and confirmed that contractors had been reminded that their working times were between 8am and 5pm. The reason for the late stay was to ensure the resident was not left without use of facilities overnight.
8. Following this, the resident remained dissatisfied that the landlord had not addressed certain aspects of her complaint. The landlord issued a further response on 27 April 2021 and apologised that it had not addressed each complaint point. It explained that:
   1. In some cases, water would need to be turned off so that other repairs could be completed. It could not confirm whether the resident was informed on the day and offered £10 compensation in view of any miscommunication.
   2. It added that the issue regarding the sink being disconnected had been resolved on the same day and this would not constitute a service failure. Likewise, the waste pipe from the kitchen running uphill had also been rectified on the same day.
   3. The issues with the cistern and the waste pipe had been temporary fixes which were to be resolved at a later date. It understood that there had been a dispute on the day that the cistern installation was scheduled and that the resident had asked the contractors to leave which in turn delayed the installation.
   4. The resident’s concerns regarding an electrical wire being cut had been rectified when it was reported. The landlord said that this was an unforeseen accident and was resolved swiftly.
9. The resident referred her complaint to this Service as she remained dissatisfied that the landlord had escalated her complaint straight to stage two of its complaints process rather than handle it at stage one. She added that the landlord’s response was not accurate and that she and her husband, spent considerable time and trouble correcting mistakes made by the landlord’s contractors because there had been no one overseeing the work to ensure it was completed correctly. 

Assessment and findings

The landlord’s handling of the refurbishment works to the resident’s kitchen and alterations to the bathroom.

10. The landlord’s repairs policy confirms that kitchen refurbishments would form part of its planned maintenance programme. The landlord would be responsible for ensuring that the work was carried out by its contractors. Prior to refurbishment works beginning, plans for the work should be agreed by the landlord and the resident and it is industry best practice for a resident to be provided with a schedule of works, setting out the works that would be completed and the estimated timeframe for each aspect of the refurbishment. It is best practice that during the works, where possible temporary cooking and washing facilities should be reinstated before contractors leave for the evening. A resident should generally be made aware in advance when the water, gas or electricity supply needs to be turned off, except in the event of an emergency.
11. The landlord initially acted appropriately by acknowledging its lack of communication regarding the start date for the refurbishment works and apologising to the resident for this. It put things right in its stage one complaint response by confirming that the works had been agreed and offering the resident £25 compensation for the time and trouble spent pursuing the matter. It appears from the information provided that the resident did not raise any further concerns regarding the initial planning of the refurbishment works. As such we can conclude that this matter had been satisfactorily resolved.
12. Once the refurbishment works began in March 2021, the resident repeatedly raised concerns about various aspects of the work being carried out by the contractors. She said that she had to report errors on several occasions which had caused significant inconvenience. It is understandable that a kitchen refurbishment is likely to cause some level of expected disturbance and inconvenience for a resident and the landlord would not be expected to compensate residents for any unavoidable inconvenience caused by the works. However, in this case there were several avoidable inconveniences caused by the landlord and its contractors handling of the refurbishment.
13. The landlord acted appropriately by acknowledging that there was no evidence to confirm that the resident had been told that the water supply to the property would need to be turned off for one day. It apologised to the resident and offered £10 in view of the inconvenience caused. It also apologised that the resident was told that she would be responsible for disconnecting appliances and noted that this was put right as the contractors had since disconnected and reconnected appliances for her. The landlord also said that it had reminded contractors of their working hours, which were between 8am and 5pm. It explained that the reason for the late stay was so that the resident was not left without the use of facilities overnight. However, the landlord failed to acknowledge that the late start time of 2:30pm may have contributed to this issue.
14. In response to the resident’s concerns regarding the incorrectly fitted toilet cistern and the leak from the waste pipe which had been covered with silicone, the landlord advised that these were temporary fixes due to be rectified later during the refurbishment. The resident disputed that the repairs were temporary as the boxing around the waste pipe appeared to have been completed. The Ombudsman has considered the resident’s comments but there may be reasons for boxing in a temporary repair, such as safety concerns regarding exposed pipework or wires. Therefore, this would not in itself confirm that the repair was intended to be permanent. In this case, there is not enough evidence to confirm whether the repairs were temporary or not. However, the resident was not clearly informed that the repairs were temporary at the time, nor were these ‘temporary’ repairs included within a schedule of works which would have outlined the process so that it was clear for all parties involved. The evidence suggest that the resident repeatedly asked the landlord to provide a schedule for the works and information regarding the work that was due to take place each day, but this does not appear to have been provided by the landlord. As such, the landlord did not satisfactorily manage the resident’s expectations which is likely to have caused uncertainty and inconvenience. This has been considered when looking at compensation.
15. The resident also raised concern that the flooring in her bathroom had been removed unnecessarily and without notice. It is unclear from the evidence provided whether the flooring needed to be replaced as part of the bathroom adaptations, although it appears that there was some confusion regarding this matter and the resident was not made aware in advance that the flooring would be removed. Ultimately, the landlord acted appropriately by attempting to provide a like-for-like replacement and had agreed to order a specific flooring at the resident’s request. However, the lack of notice and prior agreement was likely to have added to the resident’s overall distress and inconvenience.
16. In its complaint responses, the landlord advised that it had not identified any service failure as several issues such as the disconnected kitchen sink, the dispute over whether a new electrical circuit was needed in the kitchen, the kitchen waste pipe running uphill and the cut electrical wire had been put right swiftly once they had been reported. It is not disputed that the landlord put things right swiftly on each occasion which would have reduced the inconvenience to the resident. However, this would not mean that there was no inconvenience caused to the resident as she needed to raise each issue to have it resolved. Individually, these issues may not have amounted to a significant service failure or had much of an impact on the resident, however, the combination of issues that needed to be reported over a relatively short period of time is likely to have had a cumulative impact and caused distress and inconvenience to the resident. 
17. In summary, there has been service failure by the landlord in respect of its handling of the refurbishment works to the resident’s kitchen and alterations to her bathroom. In this case the resident is likely to have experienced cumulative distress by needing to repeatedly report different issues in succession over a relatively short period of time.  Furthermore, the landlord did not manage the resident’s expectations from the outset by providing a clear schedule of works with estimated timeframes of how long each aspect would take which is likely to have caused additional uncertainty.
18. In view of this, the landlord should offer the resident a further £215 in compensation for distress and inconvenience. This is in addition to the £35 offered by the landlord previously, through its complaints process. This amount of compensation is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance (published on our website) which suggests that we may award compensation of £50 to £250 in cases where we have found service failure by the landlord which had an impact on the complainant but was of short duration and may not have significantly affected the overall outcome of the complaint. Examples include failure to meet service standards for actions and responses but where the failure had no significant impact. In this case, as set out above there were failures in the landlord’s communication and handling of the refurbishment works but these errors were corrected promptly.

The landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

19. The landlord’s complaints policy states that it has a two-stage formal complaints process. At stage one, the landlord should respond within ten working days. If the resident remains dissatisfied, they can escalate their complaint to stage two. At stage two, the landlord should respond within 20 working days. If, at any stage, there is likely to be a delay, the landlord would be expected to contact the resident, explain the reason for the delay and provide a new response timescale.
20. The policy confirms that a stage two complaint will only be investigated when the response received at stage one is factually incorrect, the response received does not address the original complaint, information provided in the initial complaint has not been considered or actions agreed at stage one have not been completed as agreed. In line with the Ombudsman’s complaint Handling Code (published on our website), it is the Ombudsman’s view that where residents raise additional complaints during the investigation, these should be incorporated into the stage one response if they are relevant and the stage one response has not yet been issued. Where the stage one response has already been issued, the new issues raised should be logged as a new complaint. Only allowing one response to a complaint will be unfair if this does not allow sufficient opportunity for residents to respond to the landlord’s position, particularly where this includes information that may be new to the resident or where an issue has been overlooked by the landlord.
21. In this case, the resident initially raised a complaint on 28 January 2021 about the lack of communication from the landlord regarding the refurbishment works due to begin on 27 January 2021. This was resolved on 9 February 2021 and there was no further correspondence related to this issue. The resident also asked for a complaint to be raised on 26 March 2021 which related to various errors which had occurred since the refurbishment works began. Whilst it is not disputed that both complaints related to the refurbishment works, in line with the landlord’s complaints policy and the Ombudsman’s Complaint Handing Code, it would have been appropriate for the landlord to have raised a new stage one complaint to address the issues which occurred during the refurbishment works given the additional concerns which did not form part of the initial stage one complaint raised by the resident.
22. There is no evidence to suggest that the resident had disputed the landlord’s intention to escalate her complaint to stage two rather than raise a separate complaint at the time. However, the landlord’s stage two complaint response did not address each aspect of the complaint raised by the resident on 26 March 2021, meaning that she needed to spend additional time and trouble in seeking a response to her concerns. The Ombudsman has not been provided with a copy of the communication sent by the resident following the initial stage two complaint response, however, the landlord provided a follow-up stage two complaint response on 27 April 2021 which addressed the aspects of the complaint which had previously been overlooked. It was reasonable for the landlord to send a further response given that it had not addressed certain aspects previously, although its failure to address her concerns as a new stage one complaint did not provide the opportunity for the resident to have complaint reviewed by the landlord before approaching the Ombudsman. This has been considered as part of the Ombudsman’s overall assessment of compensation for distress and inconvenience. It is also recommended that the landlord should review its staff’s training needs to ensure that it consistently follows both its own complaints policy and the Ombudsman’s Complain Handling Code when responding to complaints.
23. For the reasons set out above, there has been service failure by the landlord in regard to its handling of the resident’s complaint. In line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance as set out above, the landlord should offer £100 compensation to the resident in recognition of the inconvenience caused by errors in its complaint handling.

Determination

24. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in its handling of refurbishment works to the resident’s kitchen and alterations to the bathroom.
25. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in its handling of the associated complaint.

Orders

26. The Ombudsman orders that the following actions are taken within four weeks:
27. The landlord is to pay the resident £350, comprised of:

a. £250 in recognition of the distress and inconvenience and time and trouble experienced by the resident as a result of its handling of the refurbishment works. This includes the landlord’s previous offer of £35 if this has not already been paid.

b. £100 in recognition of the inconvenience caused by its poor complaint handling.

 Recommendations

28. It is recommended that the landlord takes steps to ensure that residents are provided with a schedule of works prior to refurbishment works starting to adequately manage their expectations of the process and how long certain aspects may take.
29. It is recommended that the landlord considers carrying out staff training for complaint handlers to ensure that the correct process is followed when additional complaints are raised following a stage one complaint response.