Royal Borough Of Greenwich (202128542)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202128542

Royal Borough Of Greenwich

02 May 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 handling of the resident’s request for her balcony door to be fixed.

Background

2. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord. The resident lives in a block of similar properties, on the third floor of the building. The landlord does not have any vulnerabilities listed in the property; however, the resident has informed this Service that her child has autism.
3. On 27 April 2021, the resident reported that her balcony door had broken meaning she was unable to close the balcony door and it could come away from the door frame. The resident received no response to this repair request, therefore the resident reported it again on 29 June 2021.
4. On 4 August 2021, the resident reported to her landlord that she had been burgled on 3 August 2021. The resident stated access was gained via the broken balcony door. The landlord attended on the same day and completed repairs to make the door safe; however, further repairs were required to fully repair the door.
5. The resident subsequently raised a complaint about the landlord’s handling of the broken balcony door. The resident stated that she had reported the door repairs on five occasions dating back to September 2020, but had not received a response regarding the repair. The resident was disappointed that the landlord was able to attend on the same day she reported the burglary, but that when she first reported this matter she was ignored. The resident stated that she felt scared in her property, and this had impacted her and her children’s mental health.
6. In its complaint response, the landlord acknowledged that the service provided to the resident fell short of its expected standards. It apologised that when the resident reported the repairs on two occasions, these reports were not progressed as per its policy. The landlord apologised for the effect this failure had on the resident and her family.
7. The resident referred her complaint to this Service on 3 April 2022. The resident remains dissatisfied with the landlord’s response to her complaint as she believes that the landlord broke the terms of her tenancy agreement owing to the failure to repair the balcony door. As a resolution, the resident would like to be compensated for the trauma her and her family experienced as a result of the burglary. She would also like to move property as she states no longer feels comfortable at the property and it is also overcrowded.

Assessment and findings

Policies and procedures

8. The landlord’s repairs policy states that an emergency repair will be attended to within two hours of being reported. Examples of emergency repairs are boarding up windows or doors and securing a property after a break-in.
9. An urgent repair should be attended to within one working day of being reported. Examples of urgent repairs are insecure external windows, doors or locks.

Scope of investigation

10. The resident has stated in her escalation to this Service that her property is currently overcrowded. However, there is no evidence to suggest that the resident raised this with the landlord as part of her complaint. As this is a separate issue to the complaint raised with the Service, this is not something that this Service can adjudicate on at this stage, as the landlord needs to be provided with the opportunity to investigate and respond to this aspect. The resident will need to contact the landlord and, if appropriate, raise a separate complaint to get this matter resolved.
11. It is further important to note that if the resident wishes to pursue a complaint regarding the handling of an application for re-housing, she would be best suited to refer this matter to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO). This is because the Housing Ombudsman cannot consider complaints which relate to an application for re-housing specifically made to the landlord and also based around overcrowding. Complaints about the assessment of such applications, the award of points or banding, are more likely to be considered by the LGSCO. This is in accordance with paragraph 42 (k) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme.
12. It is noted that the resident has stated the burglary has impacted her mental health, and also the mental health of her children. Whilst the Ombudsman does not doubt the resident’s comments about the impact on her and her children’s mental health, this Service is unable to draw conclusions on the causation of, or liability for, impacts on health and wellbeing. However, we have considered the general distress and inconvenience which the situation involving her property has caused.

Assessment

13. The landlord’s repairs policy states that urgent repairs should be attended to within one working day. As the resident reported that her balcony door was unsecure, this would qualify as an urgent repair as per the repairs policy.
14. However, the landlord did not attend the property until 4 August 2021 which was 71 working days after the first repair was reported, and as such 70 working days outside of its policy obligation, therefore, this was a failing in the landlord’s service.
15. It is acknowledged that in her complaint the resident referenced reporting door repairs on 6 September 2020, 7 September 2020 and 9 October 2020; however, these were unrelated to the balcony door repair. The first report of the balcony door repair was on 27 April 2021. Therefore, this is when the evidence shows that the landlord was required to act in accordance with its repairs policy.
16. When failings are identified, the Ombudsman’s role is to consider whether the redress offered by the landlord has put things right and resolved the resident’s complaint satisfactorily. This is in accordance with the Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles (DRP): to be fair, put things right and learn from outcomes.
17. In the evidence provided, the landlord did apologise for the delays to the repairs process and this was reasonable in the circumstances. However, there is limited evidence that the landlord has learnt from the resident’s complaint, as the complaint response was not detailed in its reasoning as to how the failing occurred and how it would be prevented in future instances. Therefore, this Service is not confident that the landlord has identified its failings, and is capable of implementing changes to its service to ensure this does not occur again.
18. Furthermore, it did not acknowledge that its communication throughout the whole process had been poor and had meant that the resident had to make multiple efforts to contact it to request the balcony door be repaired, on at least three occasions. On at least two of those occasions when the resident reported the repair, the landlord did not respond to her. This poor communication would have caused the resident distress and inconvenience, and would have been time consuming, considering how long the matter took to resolve.
19. In addition, the landlord failed to offer the resident any compensation for the delays, distress and inconvenience caused to her as a result of the failures in its services. When taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, the landlord should have recognised the distress caused to the resident as a result of its inactions, the time and effort it took for her to continue raising the repair issue and the inconvenience caused by having to raise a complaint about the substantive issue. Its failure to offer the resident a reasonable amount of compensation, is a further shortfall in its service to the resident.
20. Following the burglary, the repair became an emergency repair and whilst the balcony door was made safe in line with the policy timeframe, a further 30 working days ensued before the landlord was able to provide a permanent repair, as this was not completed until 16 September 2021. This was a further failing.
21. Given the cumulative failings, the landlord’s actions amounted to maladministration. The landlord has therefore been ordered to pay the resident £600 for its poor communication and failure to adhere to its repairs policy. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance, which suggests awards of £100 to £600 where the landlord has acknowledged failings and made some attempt to put things right but the offer was not proportionate to the failings identified by our investigation.
22. As part of her escalation to this Service, the resident has requested to move property as a resolution. It is noted that the resident no longer feels comfortable in the property in view of what has happened. The Ombudsman can understand the resident’s reasons for wanting to move; however, the Ombudsman would not order the landlord to move a resident immediately as part of our investigation. This is because we do not have access to information regarding the availability of suitable vacant properties owned by the landlord at any one time and we do not have details of any other prospective tenants waiting to move who may have higher priority than the resident for rehousing, such as people facing homelessness or fleeing domestic violence. It is recommended that the landlord should continue to support the resident with her request to transfer from her current property and discuss her options with her, if it has not done so already.

Determination

23. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was maladministration by the landlord in way the landlord handled the resident’s request for repairs to her balcony doors.

Orders

24. The landlord is ordered to pay the resident £600 compensation for its failure to adhere to its repairs policy and attend the resident’s property within one working day of the repair being reported, the insignificant distress and inconvenience caused and for the failings in its communication.
25. This should be paid directly to the resident within four weeks of this report.

Recommendations

26. It is recommended that the landlord:
    1. Contact the resident to discuss her housing options, if it has not done so already.
    2. Review the resident’s repair logs and complaints to identify where failings occurred in relation to the repair not being progressed appropriately. The landlord should then review how it can implement changes to its handling of repair requests, in light of its review.