Riverside Housing Co-operative (Redditch) Limited (202204196)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202204196

Riverside Housing Co-operative (Redditch) Limited

29 November 2022

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 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 about the loss of heating and hot water at her property.

Background

2. The resident is a tenant of the landlord of a house, and its contractor’s records describe her as being a “vulnerable tenant”.
3. The resident reported to the landlord that she experienced intermittent heating and hot water at her property, as a result of her boiler heavily leaking and losing pressure for 29 days, from 20 December 2021 to 18 January 2022, when she experienced a total loss of heating and hot water. During this period, its contractor attended on multiple occasions, while she continued to have to return from work to empty water and top up the boiler’s water pressure up to five times a day. Their attendances included fitting parts after these became available, and inspecting the boiler, on 5, 10 and 12 January 2022, but ultimately they were unable to identify the root cause of the issues.
4. Further and continuing multiple leaks from the boiler meant that this was discontinued and the property lost heating and water on 18 January 2022, however, and a new boiler was installed on 21 January 2022, which restored the heating to the property, but not the hot water. The latter was then restored by the landlord’s contractor on 2 February 2022, resulting in there continuing to be no hot water at the property for a further 12 days after the new boiler was installed, while the resident had to travel to wash elsewhere. They subsequently re-attended this on the following day to find that both the hot water and heating remained fully restored at the property, and no further faults were identified.
5. The resident’s stage one complaint of 1 February 2022 and her final stage complaint of 2 March 2022 were regarding the delays in repairing her boiler, and her time and trouble spent pursuing the boiler repairs. This was as a result of her repeated unreturned calls about this, boiler repair appointments being cancelled without notice, and her additional expenses of £50 per week from having to travel to maintain the boiler and bathe elsewhere, lacking washing facilities and the ability to keep the property properly clean in a pandemic.
6. The resident also explained that there had been communication issues with the landlord, as she had contacted it on multiple occasions throughout December 2021, but she felt that it had not taken any action or dealt with her reports appropriately, citing several delays in its responses. She stated that it should have instead dealt with this as an emergency repair, but that it had not updated her or given her information about the cyber attack that it had been experiencing at the time.
7. The landlord’s contractor’s stage one complaint response of 15 February 2022, and their final stage complaint response of 7 March 2022, apologised for the delays in responding to the resident’s reports of her boiler malfunctions and outage, identifying that they had failed to log contact reports and repairs. They attributed this to a cyber attack that the landlord had experienced on 16 November 2021, which resulted in it and the contractor having no access to their systems or shared information for two weeks, and then limited access for a further two weeks followed by a significant backlog.
8. This had also impacted the landlord’s ability to deliver its normal service, where it was unable to communicate with its contractors to book appointments or emergency repairs, instead using a temporary manual process that took significantly longer to transfer jobs to repair teams. The contractor further informed the resident that they had experienced a higher than normal staff absences over Christmas and New Year, and an increase in call volumes, leading to longer waiting times and some jobs not coming through to them. They confirmed that they had therefore recruited more staff to clear their backlog, and given their operation and repairs supervisor feedback to improve their service. 
9. The resident then complained to this Service that she remained dissatisfied with the landlord’s contractor’s outcome to her complaint, and that she felt the landlord should have responded in a timelier manner to her requests, as it had not informed her at the time of, or publicised, its delays caused by a cyber attack. She wished to receive compensation for the amount of time that it took to respond to her reports of boiler repairs, and to be reimbursed for her additional fuel expenses from having to travel to maintain her boiler and bathe elsewhere. The resident also expressed concerns that the leaking boiler had caused water damage to a bench and cupboards in the property, as well as over the costs involved in refilling the boiler as she was on a water meter.

Assessment and finding

Scope of investigation

10. While the resident has expressed concerns about her leaking boiler damaging her cupboards and furniture in the property, these matters are outside the scope of this investigation. This is because, under the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, this Service cannot determine liability or award damages for damage to property in the way that a court or insurer might, as we do not have the authority or expertise to do so. However, consideration has been given to any distress and inconvenience that the situation may have caused the resident. It has also been recommended below that the landlord contact her to provide her with details to enable her to submit a public liability insurance claim to it or its insurer for the damages that she reported experiencing as a result of her leaking boiler.

Policies and procedures

11. In accordance with the resident’s tenancy agreement and its responsive repairs policy, the landlord is responsible for the heating and hot water system in the property. In the case of emergency repairs, its website states that it will carry out either a complete or temporary repair which aims to make the issue safe within 12 hours. The landlord aims to complete urgent gas repairs within 24 hours from October to March. For routine repairs, it aims to complete these within 28 days.
12. In accordance with the landlord’s financial redress and compensation procedure, it is required to consider reimbursing any proven actual out of pocket expenses that the resident has incurred as a result of its failure of service. It has discretion to offer compensation of up to £500 for a high impact causing significant inconvenience or distress, including from repeat incidents.

The landlord’s response to the resident’s reports about the loss of heating and hot water at her property

13. The landlord was responsible for ensuring that repairs were carried out to the resident’s boiler to restore her heating and hot water, under its responsive repairs policy and her tenancy agreement. However, while it eventually did so, its responses to her reports about this were not in line with its obligation to do so in a timely manner within its website’s repair timescales, following her reporting intermittent and lost hot water and heating in the property from December 2021 to February 2022.
14. While the landlord’s contractor’s repair records showed that numerous attempts were made to rectify the resident’s boiler between 20 December 2021 and 2 February 2022, with up to seven visits in total, it ultimately took 44 days in order to fully restore the boiler. This would have caused considerable distress and inconvenience to her, both via the lack of functional hot water and heating and the numerous attendances in order to try and resolve this, which its website obliged it to do within 12 to 24 hours.
15. The resident also reported incurring additional expenses for travelling to and from the property to maintain the boiler and to bathe, which was further exacerbated by the loss of the boiler during the winter. However, there is no evidence that the landlord or its contractor offered her either temporary heaters for the lack of heating at the property, a temporary decant, or the reimbursement of the travel expenses that she reported as a result of the outstanding boiler repair, despite the latter recording that she was a “vulnerable tenant”.
16. When such failings are identified, this Service’s role is to consider whether the redress or remedy offered by the landlord has put things right and resolved the resident’s complaint satisfactorily in all the circumstances of the case. This is in accordance with our dispute resolution principles to be fair, put things right and learn from outcomes.
17. In this case, the landlord’s contractor looked to put things right by apologising for the delays in logging the resident’s repairs, as well as their communication issues. They appropriately explained in their stage one complaint response of 15 February 2022 that a cyber attack had left the landlord unable to access its network and systems, resulting in it being unable to deliver its expected service timeframes.
18. The contractor therefore apologised for not being able to log repairs and respond accordingly, despite the resident chasing these as an emergency. They further explained in their final stage complaint response of 7 March 2022 that they had experienced a significant backlog of contact requests due to the cyber attack and staff absence. However, it was not appropriate that the resident reported that she had not informed of or received publicity at the time about the delays caused by the cyber attack, but that she was only informed of these subsequently in the contractor’s responses to her complaints.
19. The landlord’s contractor also demonstrated some learning from this case by acknowledging and seeking to improve their future service in response to these not meeting the resident’s expectations. They did so by stating that they had recruited more staff to clear their backlog, and given their operation and repairs supervisor feedback to improve their future service. However, the omission of a fair and proportionate amount of compensation being offered to the resident in recognition of its failures was a further failing on the landlord’s part in this case to be fair and put things right in all of the circumstances of the case.
20. Although the landlord’s contractor attended the resident’s reports of intermittent issues with her boiler within its website’s 28-day timescale for routine repairs, ultimately they were unable to find the root cause of this. While a repair of this nature may not be rectified in one visit, the landlord was required by its website to make safe and repair the boiler within 12 to 24 hours as a priority repair, which it failed to do. The resident instead reported that her boiler still continued to leak after each visit, resulting in multiple failed repairs throughout December 2021.
21. As the landlord’s contractor was unable to restore functionality to the boiler, they were therefore expected to temporarily repair this, although they had to await the availability of parts to attempt to do so and inspect the boiler on 5, 10 and 12 January 2022. Nevertheless, the failure of these works meant that it was determined that a replacement boiler would be needed to resolve the issue on 18 January 2022, 29 days later than the resident’s first report about this on 20 December 2021. This, her subsequent lack of heating until the boiler was replaced on 21 January 2022, and her lack of hot water until 2 February 2022, meant that the above lack of alternatives and financial remedies to her for this were unreasonable.
22. In accordance with its financial redress and compensation procedure, the landlord was required to consider any out of pocket expenses and distress and inconvenience that the resident had incurred as a result of its failings. It was therefore a failure that it did not consider her reported travel costs of £50 per week to maintain her boiler and bathe, or her resulting distress and inconvenience from having to do so because of her lack of heating and hot water and its lack of communication. In her communications to this Service, the resident highlighted further financial concerns as a result of her refilling the leaking defective boiler, due to her having a water meter.
23. Therefore, in light of the above failings, this Service’s remedies guidance and the landlord’s financial redress and compensation procedure, it has been ordered below to pay the resident a total of £400 compensation. This is broken down into £300 for the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused to her by the defective boiler, plus £100 for its delays in communication following her reports about this.
24. This is within the range of compensation recommended by the financial redress and compensation procedure for a high impact causing significant inconvenience or distress, including from repeat incidents, and by the remedies guidance for multiple failures which adversely affected the resident. The fact that the landlord’s delays and lack of communication were affected by awaiting the availability of parts and the effects of a cyber attack that were beyond its control have meant, however, that the maximum available compensation has not been ordered so as to reflect these difficulties on its part.
25. The landlord has also been ordered below to contact the resident to seek evidence of, consider and appropriately respond to her reported out-of-pocket expenses. This is in relation to its delays and failure to repair the boiler in line with its website’s repair timescales leading her to report that she incurred additional expenses to travel to maintain her boiler and bathe, and to pay her water meter. The landlord has been further recommended below to review its staff’s training needs regarding their application of its financial redress and compensation procedure, and this Service’s remedies guidance, to ensure that these are appropriately considered in every relevant case.

Determination

26. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration in respect of the landlord’s response to the resident’s reports about the loss of heating and hot water at her property.

Orders and recommendations

27. The landlord is ordered to: 
    1. Pay the resident a total of £400 compensation within four weeks, broken down as follows:
       1. £300 compensation for the distress, inconvenience, time and trouble caused by the defective boiler,
       2. £100 compensation for the delays in communicating about the repair.
    2. Contact the resident within four weeks to seek evidence of, consider and appropriately respond to her reported out-of-pocket expenses as a result of the defective boiler and its delays.
28. It is recommended that the landlord:
    1. Contact the resident to provide her with details to enable her to submit a public liability insurance claim to it or its insurer for the damages that she reported experiencing as a result of her leaking boiler.
    2. Review its staff’s training needs regarding their application of its financial redress and compensation procedure, and this Service’s remedies guidance at https://www.housing-ombudsman.org.uk/about-us/corporate-information/policies/dispute-resolution/policy-on-remedies/, to ensure that these are appropriately considered in every relevant case.
29. The landlord shall contact this Service within four weeks to confirm that it has complied with the above orders, and whether it will follow the above recommendations.