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Nottingham Community Housing Association Limited (202210335)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202210335

Nottingham Community Housing Association Limited

30 January 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

  1. The complaint is about the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports of issues with his Sky TV signal.
  2. The Ombudsman has also considered the landlord’s communication.

Background

  1. The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord, occupying a one bedroom ground floor flat within a block of flats. The tenancy commenced in 2012.
  2. As part of required work to prevent slates slipping from the building roof, scaffolding was erected to the front and rear of the building in October 2021. The resident then noticed his Sky box failed to receive signal, but left it a few days before reporting the issue to the landlord on 2 November 2021. The resident submits he was told no other tenant had reported the issue. No evidence of this conversation has been provided, but the landlord notes show it had received at least one other report of the same issue on 1 November 2021.
  3. The landlord initially recommended the resident contact Sky, which he did. Sky ran checks remotely but could not find an issue, so sent an engineer on 3 November 2021. The engineer said it was an internal issue as the Sky box was not receiving signal from the dish. The resident submits he contacted the landlord to relay the information from the Sky engineer and, whilst on the phone, it contacted its contractor and informed the resident it had arranged for an operative to attend within 6 days.
  4. The resident chased an update on 11 November 2021, as he was not aware of an operative attending and had not been contacted. The landlord emailed its contractor chasing an update, and said the target date for the job was that day. No evidence of the contractors reply has been provided, but a landlord internal note says it raised the job again on 12 November 2021, as its contractor had not received the first job.
  5. The resident submits he received a voicemail from the contractor to advise it would attend on 13 November 2021, but no one contacted him to gain access. No evidence has been provided to confirm whether the contractor attended.
  6. The resident chased for an update on 24 November 2021. The landlord’s system shows the job now had a target completion date of 30 December 2021. It spoke to its contractor who said it had sent a quote for work to address the TV signal the previous day. The Ombudsman has not been provided with a copy of this quote, or seen evidence it was received by the landlord.
  7. The resident chased again on 8 December 2021. It is unclear on the date, but the landlord said its contractor had attended, and confirmed that scaffolding around the building was blocking the Sky TV signal.
  8. The resident chased for updates on 15 and 16 December 2021 and was very frustrated. The landlord received the contractor’s quote, dated 14 December 2021, on 15 December 2021 to install a temporary dish. The landlord was confused by the quote as the building is made up of two blocks and the quote was for block 2, but the resident lives in block 1. After chasing its contractor, it was confirmed the quote covered both buildings, so the landlord escalated the job to be authorised.
  9. Having not heard anything, the resident chased for another update on 5 January 2022. The job to install the temporary dish was authorised by the landlord the following day. The resident chased again on 14 January 2022 and said he was furious and bored and that not having TV signal was affecting his mental health. The landlord called its contractor which said it was waiting for a part. The landlord’s notes say it called the resident and left a voicemail providing an update.
  10. The resident submits he received a voicemail on 21 January 2022 to say an order had been placed for the temporary dish, but the contractor did not have a required part to install the dish. It is unclear if this is the same voicemail left on 14 January 2022.
  11. The resident submits he called the landlord again towards the end of the following week, and was told the contractor was still waiting for a part. The landlord did not offer to chase anything up and, instead, asked the resident to call back if the issue was not resolved in the week. No record of this call has been provided by the landlord. The resident said that after this call he gave up as it became clear the issue was not going to be resolved. He felt the landlord had taken the decision not to do anything and wanted to wait until the scaffolding came down hoping the TV signal would return so it would not need to pay for the temporary dish.
  12. On 10 March 2022 the resident called the landlord to say the scaffolding had been taken down over the previous days but he still had no signal. The landlord contacted its contractor to cancel the installation of the temporary dish, and requested it contact the resident to investigate why he had no TV signal. The contractor attended the following day, by which point a weak TV signal had returned. No evidence of this appointment has been provided, but the resident submits the contractor said the signal should improve as scaffolding to the rear of the building had caused the issue and was in the process of being dismantled.
  13. The resident complained on 4 April 2022. He said being left without TV signal for approximately 4 and a half months was unacceptable, the landlord’s communication was poor, and he had spent considerable time and effort chasing updates.
  14. The resident submits that, 10 days after raising the complaint, he received a voicemail from the contractor to arrange an appointment for it to investigate the TV signal issue, despite it already being resolved. On 26 April 2022 he received a further email from the landlord asking if the contractor attended. The resident thought this was strange as the issue had been resolved. No evidence has been provided to this Service of the voicemail or email, but internal landlord emails show the TV signal job was booked for 28 April on 20 April 2022, and notes show the contractor attended but was unable to gain access.
  15. The landlord issued its stage 1 response on 27 April 2022 when it apologised and recognised the frustration, personal inconvenience and loss of enjoyment of the property caused by the issues. It said a temporary dish should have been installed, and offered £50 compensation.
  16. The resident contacted the landlord on 12 May 2022 as he thought the £50 did not adequately address the length of time he had been without TV signal, poor communication, and the fact he had been told a temporary dish would be installed, but it was not. He was also unhappy the landlord did not consider paying his Sky bills during the time he could not watch TV.
  17. In the landlord’s stage 2 response of 14 June 2022, it apologised again for its failure and offered to pay £898.87 to cover the resident’s full Sky service from October 2021 to April 2022. It also advised that it had made significant changes to its back office staff to avoid similar complaints in future. It did not make any reference to the £50 compensation offered for inconvenience at stage 1.
  18. The Ombudsman attempted mediation between the parties, when the resident advised he wanted his Sky service paid for, plus £50 per week for each week he was without TV signal. The landlord did not think this was reasonable, and noted that its offer to pay for the resident’s Sky service had included paying his broadband and phone which were unaffected by the scaffolding.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. During the complaint journey, the resident told the landlord and this Service about the impact not being able to watch TV had on his mental health. The Ombudsman does not dispute this, but is not in a position to determine a causal link between the landlord’s actions and the resident’s mental health. Instead, we will consider the overall distress and inconvenience that the issues in this case may have caused. If the resident wishes to pursue damages for impacts on his health, he may wish to consider making a personal injury claim, and should seek independent advice in that regard.

Handling of the resident’s reports he had lost Sky TV signal

  1. The Ombudsman has not been provided with a copy of the landlord’s repairs policy or any information on its target response times for repairs. However, given that the original target date for completion of the repair was 11 November 2021 and the contractor was not due to install the temporary dish until 11 March 2022 (which still did not happen), it is fair to say that the repair was unreasonably delayed. The resident was without TV for over months, which clearly impacted upon his enjoyment of the property, and this represents a failing by the landlord. 
  2. The evidence indicates 2 repair jobs were raised for the same issue, one for block 2 when the issue was first reported by a different resident, and one for block 1 when the resident reported his loss of Sky TV signal. Delays were caused by the contractor not receiving the first job raised for the resident, waiting for authorisation of the quote for the temporary dish, and having to wait for a part to start the job. The delays, coupled with the lack of updates provided to the resident, were a failing and caused inconvenience and increasing frustration as the months went by. 
  3. No evidence has been provided to this Service to confirm when the contractor first attended the job, and it is also unclear if it did send an original quote on 23 November 2021 as no evidence has been provided of this either. However, the landlord should have done more to chase the quote and the contractor, rather than waiting for the resident to chase updates. This was also a failing and caused inconvenience to the resident continually having to chase.
  4. The landlord’s compensation policy says it will consider compensation between £250 – £700 for considerable service failure with no permanent impact on the resident, which can include no team taking overall responsibility and failure over a considerable amount of time to address repairs. The Ombudsman has considered this position, alongside our own remedies guidance and Dispute Resolution Principles to assess a suitable level of financial redress in the circumstances.
  5. It is acknowledged that the landlord offered to cover the resident’s full Sky service for the duration of the outstanding repairs despite only the TV signal being affected. Therefore the reimbursed costs in respect of the telephone and broadband should be considered as additional compensation addressing not only the actual loss of service, but also the resident’s distress and inconvenience. Overall, the landlord has acknowledged its failings and made a proportionate offer of redress which satisfactorily addresses the complaint. Therefore, this Service makes a finding of reasonable redress and orders the landlord to pay the resident £898.87 if it has not done so already.

Landlord’s communication

  1. The evidence demonstrates that the the resident repeatedly had to chase the landlord for updates, leaving him feeling ignored and frustrated. Ultimately, he ‘gave up’ chasing due to the landlord’s lack of action and poor communication. There were clearly failings by the landlord which not only significantly inconvenienced the resident, but could have led to a breakdown in the landlord/tenant relationship going forward.
  2. The landlord initially gave incorrect advice by saying no other resident had reported the issue, which was misleading and would have left the resident feeling more uncertain about the necessary steps to resolve the problem. In addition, the landlord raised the resident’s expectations by telling him a temporary dish would be installed and this did not then materialise.
  3. The contractor attending on 28 April 2022 (when the issue had been resolved) indicates another failing in communication, this time between the landlord and its contractor. However, as the TV signal issue had been resolved by this point, any inconvenience caused to the resident by receiving further contact was minor. 
  4. The landlord’s compensation policy says it will consider compensation for service failure which can include giving incorrect information and a resident repeatedly chasing responses. Whilst the Ombudsman notes that the landlord acknowledged failings and made some attempt to put things right, its response was focused on the substantive repairs issue, rather than its communication throughout the process. It did not demonstrate adequate consideration of the effect of its lack of updates, misinformation and, at times, confusing handling of the matter. As a result, the Ombudsman has found service failure specifically in relation to the landlord’s communication and ordered it to pay a further £100 compensation to address the time and effort expended by the resident, which exacerbated an already difficult and frustrating time for him.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme, the landlord has made an offer of redress to the resident, with respect to its handling of the reports of Sky TV signal issues, which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint satisfactorily.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was service failure with the landlord’s communication.

Orders and recommendations

  1. Within 4 weeks of the date of this report, the landlord is ordered to:
    1. Pay the resident compensation of £998.87 made up of:
      1. £898.87 to cover the resident’s Sky service.
      2. £100 for distress and inconvenience.