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Peabody Trust (202208366)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202208366

Peabody Trust

18 December 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 response to the resident’s queries about his service charges.
  2. This Service has also investigated the landlord’s complaint handling.

Background

  1. The resident and his wife are shared owners of the property with the landlord. Both will be referred to as the resident throughout this report.
  2. The resident complained to the landlord on 18 February 2022 about variations in the service charges paid by him and his neighbour. He said there had been differences in the estimated and actual service charges in previous years and believed the landlord had been overcharging him since 2016.
  3. The landlord provided a stage 1 response to the resident on 19 August 2022. It explained how the resident’s service charges were calculated, and why there could be variations between households in charges. The landlord apologised for the delays in responding to the resident and offered £100 compensation for his time, trouble and inconvenience.
  4. The resident escalated his complaint on 2 September 2022. He complained that he had not received explicit assurance that his charges were not different to his neighbours. He also said the landlord had provided poor service. The resident felt the compensation offered by the landlord was too low.
  5. The landlord provided a stage 2 response to the resident on 30 September 2022. It apologised for the delays in responding to him. It also increased its compensation offer to £150, acknowledging that the resident had to chase it on several occasions for a response. It confirmed the resident had been paying the correct amount of service charges, and that it does not have to process freedom of information requests as it is not a public body.
  6. The resident brought his complaint to this Service following the landlord’s stage 2 response. He remained dissatisfied with its response to the variation in service charge between properties and sought further compensation to the amount offered by the landlord in its stage 2 response.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. Some of the points raised by the resident in his complaint to the landlord related to the level of service charge. While the Ombudsman can consider how a landlord responds to service charge queries or provides service charge information, actual disputes about the level of service charges are more appropriately considered by the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber). The Tribunal has the function of judging disputes over leasehold issues like service charges, and can investigate and make orders further than the Ombudsman can. Because of that, in line with paragraph 42(d) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, this investigation will consider the landlord’s responses to the resident’s queries, but will not seek to determine the reasonableness of his service charge costs.

The landlord’s response to the resident’s queries about his service charges

  1. In its complaint responses, the landlord provided detailed explanations about the resident’s query relating to the management of his service charge account and why there may be variations in amounts charged to different properties. It explained that it is billed at varying times for different properties by its external management agent. This meant that bills for each property might not be the same in each period but do adjust in the following period. It included copies of invoices and budgets as part of its response to him which reflected this.
  2. In response to the resident’s request to compare his charges with his neighbours’ the landlord explained why it could not do so. That was a reasonable response, because other leaseholders’ information was not something it could usually be expected to share without the relevant permissions.
  3. The resident requested an explanation about the difference between the estimated and actual service charge. The landlord explained that it calculates its estimated charges ahead of time which includes some assumptions. This meant that on occasion the actual amount charged would be higher than its estimates. It apologised for not communicating this to him. This explanation was correct and reflected the reality of how service charges are generally managed and calculated in a leasehold, however this Service has not been provided with any evidence to show whether this had been explained to the resident prior to this complaint.
  4. In its stage 2 response on 30 September 2022, the landlord explained to the resident that he is entitled to review the service charge invoices at the office of the external management agent but that these records would not include service charges for other properties.
  5. In both complaint responses the landlord provided full and detailed explanations for the issues raised by the resident. It included copies of invoices for his property and a copy of the full service charge budget for 2020/2021 in its stage 1 response. The resident’s concerns are somewhat understandable, in the circumstances, however, nothing has been seen in this investigation which might indicate the landlord’s explanations were inaccurate.

The landlord’s complaint handling

  1. The resident made a formal complaint to the landlord on 18 February 2022. While it acknowledged this complaint on 23 February 2022, the landlord did not provide a formal reply until 19 August 2022. The landlord’s complaints policy states that a stage 1 complaint should have a response within 10 working days. The time taken in this case clearly exceeded that time frame significantly. The landlord apologised for the delays, explaining that it had experienced staff shortages.
  2. The landlord offered the resident compensation of £100 in its stage 1 response. This was for time, trouble and inconvenience relating to its delay in providing a response. The resident disputed this amount in his stage 2 escalation and the amount was then increased to £150 by the landlord at stage 2. The amount offered is in line with its compensation policy. The landlord also explained that it is recruiting more staff as staff shortages had led to an increase in complaints which it had learnt from.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was no maladministration in respect of the landlord’s response to the resident’s queries about his service charge account.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme, the landlord has offered redress to the resident prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, satisfactorily resolves the complaint about its complaint handling.

Recommendations

  1. The landlord should consider ensuring information about service charge estimate calculations is provided to residents at the earliest opportunity when a tenancy, leasehold or other occupancy agreement begins.