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Peabody Trust (202008304)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202008304

Peabody Trust

24 May 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 request for a new key fob to access the communal front door.

Background and summary of events

  1. The resident is a shared ownership leaseholder and resides in a property in a purpose-built block of flats. The landlord owns the freehold and is responsible for repairs to the structure and exterior of the property and the communal parts of the building. 
  2. On 2 March 2020 the resident contacted the landlord to report that her keyfob was faulty and requested 2 new fobs (one spare). On 9 March 2020 and 13 March 2020, the resident rang the landlord chasing replacement fobs which she still required. On 23 March 2020, the landlord rang resident to discuss the issues she was experiencing, however the resident was unwell and was unable to talk. On 31 March 2020, the resident called into the landlord’s office in order to obtain replacement fobs. The following day, on 1 April 2020, the tenant called the landlord and was advised to call back once the offices had re-opened as they were closed due to the covid-19 pandemic.
  3. On 5 May 2020, the resident called the landlord to report that her fobs had completely stopped working. On the same day, the landlord wrote to the resident and advised that it was unable to issue her with an additional fob key due to the covid-19 lockdown and advised that it was working on limited capacity and dealing with emergency cases only. 
  4. On 27 May 2020, the fobs were posted first class to the resident’s address. However, the resident has advised that she never received this package.
  5. On 7 June 2020, the resident wrote to the landlord and noted that she wished for the complaint to be escalated. The resident was unhappy that she had not received a replacement fob. She noted that initially the fob was faulty but about a month prior it had completely stopped working. The resident felt that whilst the landlord staff were working from home, it should be possible for at least one member of staff to either visit the empty office or deal with emergency issues.
  6. On 9 June 2020, the landlord wrote to the resident and acknowledged her complaint. The landlord noted that whilst the resident contacted it through its online complaints form in April, this was not dealt with as a complaint. The landlord noted that it had provided a response which went through the issues and apologised that it had not been raised through its complaints process. The landlord confirmed that it would raise a stage 1 complaint.
  7. On 18 June 2020, the landlord wrote to the resident and confirmed that they would investigate the complaint and provide a response on or before 2 July 2020.
  8. On 24 June 2020, the landlord provided its stage 1 response to the resident. The landlord acknowledged poor service and apologised for this. It noted that it had sent replacement fobs on 27 May 2020 but that the resident had not received this. It acknowledged that the original request was prior to lockdown however it stated it was dealing with an extensive backlog along with staff shortages. The landlord enclosed two sets of fobs in the letter as replacements.
  9. On 1 July 2020, the resident wrote to the landlord to request that the complaint was escalated to stage two of the complaints process. The resident was unhappy with the service that she received in particular:
  1. She alleged that all service provision from the landlord was halted for 4 months;
  2. She paid £100 per month in service charges but with no service provision.
  1. On 6 July 2020, the landlord wrote to the resident and noted that according to its complaint procedure before it escalates a complaint, it looks to see if anything can be done to resolve the complaint at stage one. It offered the resident £100 compensation for the time, trouble, and inconvenience that the issue caused her.
  2. On 17 July 2020, the landlord wrote to the resident and advised that the complaint had been escalated to stage 2 and a response would be provided by 14 August 2020.
  3. On 13 August 2020, the landlord provided its stage 2 response. The landlord noted that the complaint that the resident made on 2 March was treated as a service request because she was asking for a replacement key fob. It was not allocated to an officer until 23 March due to a lack of resources. The officer rang the resident on the same day to discuss the matter, but the resident informed the landlord that she was too unwell to discuss the matter.
  4. The landlord acknowledged the delays in contacting the resident partially caused by the fact that there two separate cases were logged were not linked. It offered the complainant a revised offer of £150 which it believed was proportionate in line with its Compensation Policy.
  5. On 28 August 2020, the landlord wrote to the resident as she had expressed disappointment with its final response. The landlord acknowledged the service she received was poor and noted that its service was severely impacted by the implementation of the government lockdown. The landlord reiterated its previous compensation offer.

Assessment and findings

  1. The landlord’s repairs policy states that an emergency repair is needed “to avoid an immediate danger to personal health or safety or serious damage to property.” The replacement of the fob would not come under the landlord’s definition of an emergency repair and would be a routine repair “where there is no risk to either the customer or the landlord’s asset”. Whilst it was very difficult for the complainant when she could not gain access to the communal door of the property, there was no personal danger to her health or her property. She could also gain access to the building through neighbour’s assistance. The landlord’s repairs policy states that routine repairs will be completed within 35 days but will often be completed sooner.
  2. When the complainant first reported that the fobs were faulty, the landlord did not revert to the complainant for three weeks. The resident contacted the landlord on 2 March and it was not until 23 March that the case was assigned a caseofficer who then contacted the resident.  The landlord acknowledged that this was not reasonable, and it was appropriate for the landlord to say that. The landlord had enough time to deal with this request before the lockdown measures came into force. Also, it does not appear that a site visit was necessary to resolve the issue. It is clear that the landlord acknowledged that delays took place, and the issue was not attended to in a manner expected. It is also unfortunate that the landlord’s letter of 27 May 2020 enclosing the replacement fob was not received by the resident. However, the Ombudsman has been provided with evidence to show that this letter was sent.
  3. The key fobs completely stopped working on 5 May 2020. The landlord set out the difficulty it faced in accessing the office, which was reasonable due to covid-19 restrictions. However, it did not clarify that the access to the office was required to access replacement fobs or why this could not be facilitated remotely. It is evident that on 16 March 2020 the government advised staff to work from home and lockdown regulations came into effect in the United Kingdom on 26 March 2020 with guidance being provided to landlords on 28 March which provided “Landlords should know they should not be unfairly penalised where COVID-19 restrictions prevent them from meeting some routine obligations.”
  4. The landlord advised that some communication issues were caused by some staff home working. The investigation acknowledged that the situation presented by the pandemic was unprecedented and the circumstances were such that the landlord was required to operate on a reduced capacity at short notice, through no fault of its own. The Ombudsman found that, by recognising that there was a shortfall in service, explaining the reasons for this to the resident, and apologising for the impact upon her, the landlord adequately addressed the communications complaint.

The landlord’s offer

  1. In its stage 1 response the landlord offered its apologies for the inconvenience that the resident had experienced, in particular as she had a young child and had difficulty accessing the building. Following the stage 1 complaint response, the landlord further considered the matter and offered £100 compensation for the time trouble and inconvenience that the issue had caused the resident.
  2. In its stage 2 response, the landlord apologised that the resident was in a position where she found herself with restricted ability to enter the communal entrance. It noted that the findings would be reported to the relevant business areas to enable improvements in the landlord’s services. It revised its compensation offer to £150 which was made up of £50 for complaint handling and £100 for the resident’s time and trouble for the inconvenience it experienced when pursuing replacement key fobs.
  3. The landlord offered £100 compensation for time trouble and inconvenience this was at the maximum end of the scale for “minor disruption” under the landlord’s compensation policy. The landlord offered £50 compensation for complaint handling, this was referred to as a “moderate failure” under the landlords compensation policy. A moderate failure is defined as “failure to follow the complaints policy or procedure or correctly investigate a complaint resulting in inconvenience and effort to progress”. The Housing Ombudsman Service’s guidance on calculating financial redress provides that awards of £50 to £250 may be used for instances of service failure resulting in some impact on the complainant.
  4. The landlord’s compensation offer was appropriate and in accordance with the guidance of the Housing Ombudsman Service’s expected scale. It is also noted that the compensation was not the only remedy as the landlord also apologised and spoke how it would learn from outcomes.

Determination (decision)

  1. In accordance with paragraph 32(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord has made redress to you which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint satisfactorily.

Reasons

  1. There were some service failures in the landlord’s handling of the request for a replacement fob and formal complaints process. It failed to allocate an officer for over three weeks after the initial report to it and there was a significant delay in getting the replacement fob to the resident. However, the landlord’s offer of £150 to the resident represents adequate redress to these service failures.

Recommendations

  1. It is recommended that the landlord does the following within the next 4 weeks:

a.     Re-offers the award of £150, if it has not already been accepted by the resident

b.     Takes steps to ensure that complaints are logged correctly and there is no potential for the same issues to be logged multiple times