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Red Kite Community Housing Limited (202209900)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202209900

Red Kite Community Housing Limited

6 March 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 landlord’s response to reports of roof tiles falling onto the resident’s partner’s car during a storm.
  2. The landlord’s delay in completing remedial works.
  3. The landlord’s response to claims the roof has been defective since 2019.

Determination (jurisdictional decision)

  1. When a complaint is brought to the Ombudsman, we must consider all the circumstances of the case as there are sometimes reasons why a complaint will not be investigated.
  2. After carefully considering all the evidence, I have determined that the complaint, as set out above, is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.

Summary of events

  1. On 24 May 2022, the resident’s partner raised a formal stage 1 complaint relating to the alleged roofing repair not being conducted correctly in 2019 and a request for the landlord to pay a car insurance excess.
  2. On 24 June 2022, the landlord provided its stage 1 response where it did not uphold the complaint as it did not find any failures with the service it had provided.
  3. The resident’s partner escalated the complaint on 27 June 2022, as he remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s explanation regarding the reported repairs in 2022 and said that the repairs carried our in 2019 were not completed correctly.
  4. The landlord provided its stage 2 response on 14 July 2022 where it partially upheld the complaint as it acknowledged that it should not have taken 5 months to carry out roofing repairs in 2022 and offered £250 compensation. The compensation was paid on 15 July 2022.
  5. On 10 August 2022 the resident’s partner contacted the Ombudsman as remained dissatisfied with the complaint response and was seeking a rent refund and an apology from the landlord.

Reasons

  1. Paragraph 25(a) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme states that a person who is or has been in a landlord/tenant relationship with a member, can use the Scheme. This includes people who have a lease, tenancy, licence to occupy, service agreement, or other arrangement to occupy premises owned or managed by a member.
  2. After reviewing the information available to the Ombudsman, the resident’s partner is not named on the tenancy agreement, and therefore does not have landlord/tenant relationship. Furthermore, there is no indication that the complaint has been made on behalf of the resident.
  3. Therefore, after carefully considering all the evidence, in accordance with paragraph 41(a) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, which states that the Ombudsman cannot consider complaints which were not referred to the Ombudsman by one of the people who can use the Scheme under paragraph 25, the complaint is outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.