Peabody Trust (202231919)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202231919

Peabody Trust

31 July 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

The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of the resident’s requests for refurbishment of her kitchen and bathroom.
The Ombudsman has also considered the landlord’s handling of the associated complaint.

Background

The property is a 1-bedroom flat on the second floor of a block of flats. The resident has lived in the property since March 2015 when the building was owned by a different landlord. In March 2020, the resident became an assured tenant of the current landlord (a housing association) following a merger between her former landlord and the current one.
Under the landlord’s asset management policy, refurbishments are considered to be “investment works” to improve or update parts of the property, as opposed to responsive repairs or cyclical works (routine maintenance).
According to the resident, in 2015 when she moved in, the taps in her bathroom were unfit for purpose as they were too close to the rim of the sink and she could not use them effectively. She reported that a surveyor attending her property observed the bathroom’s facilities were “outdated” but the landlord did not carry out any repairs or replacement.
The resident stated that from 2015 to 2019 various surveyors attended due to intermittent leaks in her bathroom and they had commented on how “old-style” her bathroom was. She reported that sometime around 2019, after another such visit, she received a letter from the current landlord to say her property was due to be refurbished in the financial year 2020/21. The Ombudsman has not seen a copy of this letter and the landlord says it had no such record.
On 30 November 2020, the resident called the landlord to ask it to bring forward the refurbishments, as she had a number of outstanding issues she would prefer to be resolved with a refurbishment rather than repairs. She asked the landlord to provide a timeframe on when this would happen. The landlord replied that the investment team would contact her closer to the time when works were due to begin.
On 12 April 2021, the resident called the landlord again on this issue. Four days later (16 April 2021) the landlord replied via voicemail that all internal works were on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It said again it would contact the resident before the works commenced.
The landlord’s Stock Condition team sent the resident a letter on 24 August 2021 to say it had the resident “down on the programme plan for a kitchen/bathroom work for the year 2022/23, please note these dates are subject to change”, and repeated that the investment delivery team would contact her closer to the time when the works were due to proceed. There was no further explanation on when she could expect to hear from the investments team or what may cause the dates to change.
The resident called again on 9 February 2022 on the same issue. The landlord advised it could not provide any estimated dates, explaining the letters had always said “terms were subject to change, there were no guarantees” and the resident would be contacted closer to the time when works began. Similar exchanges happened again on 4 April 2022 and 6 October 2022, with the same responses from the landlord.
The resident asked to raise a service complaint on 4 April 2022 and the landlord declined to accept this as “there was no service failure”. It repeated to the resident that the investments team would contact her about a month before the works began, but gave no information on when that might be. The resident asked the landlord if the refurbishments would be for both the kitchen and the bathroom or one of the rooms only. There is no record of a response from the landlord.
The landlord’s Stock Condition team issued a second letter on 17 October 2022 to the resident to say it had “reviewed the stock condition data for the property and can confirm the kitchen is due to be renewed in 2023/24”, noting that “the date is subject to change”. There was again no further explanation on what might cause the dates to change.
On 6 February 2023 the resident called again with the same enquiries, explaining that should she not get a definite answer on the dates, she would complain to her local member of parliament. The landlord arranged a survey for the kitchen and the bathroom in the same month.
Two weeks later (20 February 2023) the landlord issued a letter to the resident to say it had reviewed the stock condition data and the surveyor found that the kitchen and bathroom were not in need of renewal within the next three years (until February 2026).
The resident raised a complaint on 23 February 2023 to say the landlord had not carried out its promises despite sending her at least two letters to first state the refurbishments would be done in 2022/23 and then to postpone it to 2023/24. She added that the residents of all the other properties in the block were offered refurbishments to their kitchens and bathrooms in 2013 but the previous tenant in her property did not accept this, leading to her property “missing out”.
The landlord noted internally on 23 February 2023 that the property was “not on the investment delivery projected programme of kitchens and bathrooms”.
The landlord provided a stage 1 complaint response on 8 March 2023 summarised as follows:
1. It apologised that it had sent letters to the resident over the past few years that contained “wrong information”.
2. The kitchen and bathroom would not be due for renewal for the next 3 years following the survey in February 2023.
3. It would arrange repairs for the resident about specific concerns she had raised over phone calls (there was no further information in the letter about which concerns these were).
4. It had carried out training for staff on communication and record-keeping.
5. It offered £25 to the resident for the distress and inconvenience caused by its miscommunication.
The landlord attended the property on 24 March 2023 in relation to a repair issue about the bath panel raised by the resident. Having inspected the bathroom, it decided to replace the taps on the bath and the basin with a new basin tap and a new mixer tap in the bath, adding a shower attachment with the resident’s agreement.
The resident subsequently complained that the landlord had not kept its promises of refurbishment and asked for an escalation of her complaint on 30 March 2023.
The landlord provided a stage 2 complaint response on 5 May 2023 as follows:
1. It repeated its position that it relied on the stock condition data and the recent survey from February 2023 to reach the decision that the resident’s kitchen and bathroom were “reasonably modern” and not in need of renewal.
2. It has to focus resources on where they were most needed and invest based on the condition of the property, rather than age.
3. It repeated that the previous letters were “sent out in error” and had raised the resident’s expectations unduly.
4. It acknowledged its stage 1 response lacked detail and there was a delay in it providing a stage 2 response.
5. It had expanded its customer experience team and was taking the opportunity of a recent merger to review and assess its policies and procedures (there is no further information on what specific policies and procedures it was referring to).
6. It offered the resident £150 (broken down as £50 for the time, trouble and inconvenience caused by miscommunication in the two letters, and £100 for poor complaint handling).
After receiving this response, the resident sought assistance from her local member of parliament, complaining that, as the bath had no shower unit, she had to bend down to wash her hair with the water from the bath tap, causing back problems. She explained to the landlord in subsequent correspondence that, although there were issues with the kitchen, she had not raised these as repairs previously as she had believed they would be resolved with an imminent refurbishment.
By 11 May 2023, the landlord’s repairs log showed it had carried out repairs to the bathroom. It rewired the hot and cold pipework, removed “faulty bib taps”, fitted the new shower rise kit, and replaced the taps to the bath and sink as well as the bath panel. The following month, it replaced the tiles of the bathroom from the ceiling to the bath tub.
The resident referred the matter to this Service in June 2023 seeking a “definite date for refurbishment to the kitchen and bathroom”.
In June and July 2023 the resident requested repair works to the bath panel and bathroom flooring. The landlord carried out repairs and repainted the bathroom wall. The landlord’s records also showed the resident had requested repairs to the kitchen but the Ombudsman has not seen records to show what specific repairs these were.
The resident has stated to this Service that her desired outcome remains a complete refurbishment of the kitchen and the bathroom by the landlord.

Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

This Service has heard the resident’s account that she first received a letter from the landlord around 2019 stating that parts of the flat were due to be refurbished in 2020/21. There is no copy of this letter in the records. The earliest written records were from November 2020 when the resident made a call to the landlord regarding the refurbishments. From that point in time up until her formal complaint in February 2023, the resident was acting on the landlord’s repeated reassurances that the kitchen and bathroom refurbishments would take place in the future. She was not in a position to know there was cause for bringing a formal complaint earlier. This investigation will therefore focus on the landlord’s handling of the resident’s enquiries starting from November 2020.
This investigation will also consider the repairs the landlord has carried out from May to July 2023 (after the end of the internal complaints process) as they are directly related to the matters in the complaint.

The landlord’s handling of the requests for refurbishment

Our Spotlight Report on knowledge and information management (KIM) is clear that landlords need to have an effective strategy in place to make sure staff can easily access the information they require for evidence-based practice and informed decision-making. The Spotlight Report points out that when landlords merge, there is often a risk of legacy data becoming inaccessible. As part of any merger process, a landlord should proactively investigate incoming datasets and identify any gaps in the knowledge of the property stock and residents, and work to fill these gaps.
Applying these principles to investment works planning, the Ombudsman would expect the landlord to keep a clear list of which of its properties were due for refurbishment, to review this information when the merger occurred, and then to complete any necessary survey in order to update its knowledge. This list should contain information including but not limited to: the projected dates for work commencement on each property, which rooms needed refurbishment, the last time the rooms were renewed, and the last time they were surveyed. The landlord should be able to cross-reference this list with its survey reports so as to assess the condition of the rooms, the extent of works needed, and any other factors (e.g. residents’ vulnerabilities) that may mean the work should be prioritised.
The landlord’s staff should be able to access this list and respond to resident enquiries accordingly. The residents should be kept informed if and when they can expect a refurbishment. If, for any reason, the projected timeframes could not be met, the landlord should be able to provide a clear explanation to the resident why that was the case, and when the new projected timeframe would be. If a property is removed from the refurbishment programme for any reason, there should also be a timely notification and explanation to the resident why that was the case.
There is no dispute that the landlord’s communication with the resident has been poor. The landlord has acknowledged this in a general manner in its complaint responses. It offered financial compensation of £150 in recognition of the resident’s time and trouble in chasing updates. It explained briefly that the two letters it sent to the resident (containing notices for upcoming refurbishments) were “sent out in error”.
The Ombudsman considers that this was not sufficient redress. From November 2020 to February 2023, on 7 recorded occasions, the resident raised enquiries with the landlord seeking to confirm when the refurbishments would happen and which of her rooms were due for renewal. Each time, the landlord provided identical responses on the phone to say it could not provide any timeframe and she needed to wait until the investments team contacted her. No response was given to the resident’s enquiry on which rooms would be renewed and there were repeated missed opportunities to proactively check the current position and give the resident an accurate response.
The Stock Condition team sent out two separate letters, in August 2021 and then in October 2022, to reassure the resident that the works would go ahead within the upcoming financial year with the condition that “dates were subject to change”. There was no explanation in the second letter as to why the date was postponed from 2022/23 to 2023/24. Nor was there any information as to when the resident could expect to be updated with a more specific timeframe and why these dates might change. The resident remained under the belief that the landlord would deliver these works eventually and she had no choice but to wait as advised by the landlord. This caused the resident prolonged distress and frustration.
The resident claimed that the Stock Condition team had sent out an earlier letter around 2019 which contained a similar notification that the refurbishments was due in 2020/2021. As the Service has seen no record of this letter and the landlord did not have a record of it, the Ombudsman cannot say with reasonable confidence whether it was sent or not, or what it contained. However, the two letters sent in 2021 and 2022 indicated a failing with the landlord’s communication and information management.
It is concerning that for more than 2 years (November 2020 to February 2023), no one handling the resident’s enquiries accessed the internal list of ongoing investments works to check the resident’s status – whether her property was actually on the list of properties planned for renewal, which rooms were included, and when they were last surveyed. Staff could have raised an internal enquiry to get this information, or put the resident directly in touch with the investments team to respond, but no one did so. This situation persisted until February 2023 when the resident said she would escalate her enquiry and complain to her local member of parliament.
The landlord conducted a survey in February 2023. There is no record of any survey having taken place before then. Afterwards, in response to the resident’s complaint, the landlord checked its internal records and found her property was not listed for kitchen and bathroom refurbishment. This was in direct contradiction to the two letters sent out by the Stock Condition team in the two years before. This undoubtedly caused the resident distress and upset.
The resident has advised that during that time, despite experiencing problems with using her bathroom, she refrained from asking for repairs as she believed the issues would be resolved by an imminent refurbishment. She had no shower unit and had to bend down in order to wash her hair with water from the bath taps, which she says resulted in back problems for which she had to attend her GP.
There is no record that the resident made the landlord aware of this until February 2023. As the landlord remained unaware of these issues, it should not be held at fault for not addressing them during that time. However, the Ombudsman’s opinion is that from November 2020 until February 2023, the landlord missed multiple opportunities to verify the property’s status on its investment works list and carry out a survey to check the property’s actual condition. A survey of the property should include a discussion with the resident, which could have revealed that the lack of a shower unit was causing her physical strain, there was no mixer tap on the bath which must have been inconvenient, and other inadequacies in the facilities.
The Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS) states “The positioning and location of amenities, fittings and equipment and the design and layout of dwellings has an effect on convenience of use. Inappropriate positioning of amenities and equipment may cause physical strain. For example, strain can result from awkward positioning of windows, difficult to operate window catches, inadequate functional space such as low headroom, inadequate space around bathroom or kitchen facilities, or inappropriate siting of facilities.”
The evidence indicates that from November 2020 to May 2023, the bathroom possibly did not have appropriately positioned facilities, which was part of the requirements under the HHSRS standard. The survey in February 2023 did not seem to have identified this issue nor taken this into account when concluding the bathroom did not need refurbishment works. The landlord has only said the survey found the bathroom was “reasonably modern”.
It was only after the resident brought a formal complaint that the landlord reviewed its responses and decided to carry out repairs. As of June 2023, the landlord has installed a shower attachment and replaced the original taps with a basin tap and a mixer tap on the bathtub, as well as re-tiled the bathroom, which is a positive step and should have partially if not completely mitigated the resident’s concerns.
Throughout the internal complaints process, the resident has focused primarily on the inadequate facilities of the bathroom. Although the resident has also requested refurbishments to the kitchen, the condition of the kitchen remains unclear, including whether the resident had any difficulty using the facilities and what works would be required if any. The landlord’s survey in February 2023 concluded that the kitchen was “reasonably modern” and not in need of renewal.
The landlord has explained to the local member of parliament supporting the resident in her enquiries that, as a charitable organisation, it needed to focus its resources on where the needs are most urgent and therefore a property that remained in good condition, even if there had been no investment works for a long time, may not be designated for refurbishments. The Ombudsman accepts that priorities for investment may change from year to year due to budget considerations.
However, having considered the overall handling of this case, it is the Ombudsman’s opinion that the landlord has not taken timely or sufficient action to survey the property and to understand the resident’s concerns with using the facilities. Accordingly, an order has been made below for the landlord to meet with the resident to discuss what difficulties she may experience with using the facilities, and re-consider if a new survey might be needed.
The landlord has made an apology and offered £50 to the resident in recognition of the distress and frustration caused by unduly raised expectations following its two letters. The Ombudsman considers that due to the landlord not providing accurate information, delays in conducting surveys and not checking the property’s status on the refurbishment programme, the resident experienced more than 2 years of distress, inconvenience and uncertainty. The resident withheld from requesting repairs during that time because she was expecting refurbishments and this added to her sense of distress later on. In the Ombudsman’s view the landlord has not offered adequate redress to reflect this impact.
Due to the reasons set out above, the Ombudsman finds maladministration in relation to the landlord’s handling of the resident’s requests for refurbishments, which were caused by failings in knowledge and information management, communication and surveying.
The landlord has previously received a Wider Order from this Service to conduct a self-assessment against our Spotlight Report on knowledge and information management, as well as review its complaint handling practices, after which it was to complete a report and share this with the Ombudsman. Although these Wider Orders were issued in the context of cases about repair issues rather than refurbishments or investment works, the Ombudsman considers the learning from these Wider Orders should apply to the failings identified in this investigation as well. The Ombudsman will make no further Wider Orders to avoid duplication but will make an order under paragraph 54g of the Scheme for the landlord to review learnings from this case.

The landlord’s complaint handling

The landlord’s complaints policy defines a complaint as “an expression of dissatisfaction, however made, about the standard of service, actions or lack of action by the landlord or those acting on its behalf”. It stated that a complaint would for example be about “an action or lack of action in response to a request for service” and “failure to follow an approved policy or procedure”.
The above policy provides for a two-stage complaints procedure. Once the complaint was accepted, the landlord should respond to the complaint within 10 working days (stage 1). If the complainant asked for the complaint to be escalated to stage 2 (the final stage), it should respond within 20 working days.
The resident asked to raise a service complaint on 4 April 2022 when she did not receive information on when she could expect the refurbishments to happen. The landlord’s response was that it considered “there was no service failure” and it would not take her complaint forward. The resident did not act further at the time, but later made another formal complaint in February 2023, which was accepted and progressed through the two-stage process.
The complaint in April 2022 was about a perceived lack of action in response to a request for refurbishment services. The landlord should have accepted this as a formal complaint and properly investigated at the time. Instead, the landlord concluded it was without fault in the absence of any proper investigation and effectively barred the resident from exercising her right to complain. This was inappropriate, unfair to the resident, and against our principles of dispute resolution. The landlord missed an opportunity to check the resident’s status on the refurbishment programme and review the condition of her property. As a result, the resident waited about 10 months more for an eventual outcome which would cause distress and disappointment for her as the landlord then concluded it would not refurbish her property.
The landlord’s complaint responses at both stage 1 and stage 2 provided no more explanation for the repeated conflicted information given over the period of more than two years, other than an acknowledgement that it had sent out two letters “in error”. Neither response addressed the resident’s assertion that the landlord had “broken its promises”, nor recognised the impact this would have had on the resident. In line with our principles of dispute resolution, the Ombudsman expects landlords to be fair and transparent towards residents and to take a formal complaint as an opportunity to review what has happened, to learn from mistakes and put things right. Both the stage 1 and 2 responses lacked insight into what caused the prolonged delay in providing the resident with accurate information and a definite answer.
The landlord’s stage 2 complaint response acknowledged that its stage 1 complaint response was lacking in detail and there was a delay in its stage 2 response (about 5 days). It offered £100 in recognition of the resident’s time and trouble and the distress caused by poor complaint handling. While this goes some way towards mitigating the impact on the resident, as stated above, there was no full acknowledgement of the failings that happened or explanation of any learning taken from this case.
As the landlord failed to follow due process to investigate the complaint in April 2022 and failed to acknowledge what went wrong with its information management, the Ombudsman finds maladministration in relation to the landlord’s complaint handling.

Determination

In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the Ombudsman finds maladministration in relation to the landlord’s handling of the resident’s requests for kitchen and bathroom refurbishments.
In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the Ombudsman finds maladministration in relation to the landlord’s complaints handling.

Orders and recommendations

Orders

Within 4 weeks from the date of this report, the landlord is to provide a written apology to the resident to acknowledge the failings identified in this report.
Within 4 weeks from the date of this report, the landlord is to pay to the resident £550 (inclusive of the £150 it has previously offered), broken down as follows:
1. £300 in recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused by poor knowledge and information management, poor communication and lack of surveying.
2. £250 in recognition of the distress and inconvenience caused by poor complaint handling.
Within 4 weeks from the date of this report, the landlord is to meet with the resident to carry out a risk assessment for her to identify any difficulties she may experience with using the amenities in the kitchen and the bathroom, with regard to the HHSRS guidance on appropriate positioning of facilities. The landlord is to review whether further works are needed, and communicate this to the resident. The landlord is then to write to the Ombudsman within 6 weeks from the date of this report, with a summary of its discussion and risk assessment with the resident and what follow-up actions it has decided on.
Under paragraph 54g of the Scheme, within 12 weeks from the date of this report, the landlord should carry out a review of the findings in this report and prepare an action plan of how it intends to address the following issues:
1. How it manages its data on stock condition and list of refurbishment works and shares that internally.
2. How it conducts surveys to inform decisions on which properties were due for refurbishment and if these surveys include discussions with the residents to identify any difficulties with using the amenities in line with the relevant home standards including HHSRS guidelines.
3. How its customers experience team or customer enquiries team responds to enquiries on upcoming refurbishments, ensuring that accurate information is provided.
Within 12 weeks from the date of this report, the landlord should share a summary of the aforesaid action plan with the Ombudsman.