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The Riverside Group Limited (202117955)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202117955

The Riverside Group Limited

21 July 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:
    1. The landlord’s handling of repairs to the communal electric car park gates.
    2. The level of the service charge raised by the landlord in respect of the electric car park gate repair.
    3. The landlord’s handling of the section 20 consultation process.
    4. The landlord’s handling of the complaint.

Background

  1. The complainant is a leaseholder of a flat owned by the landlord. The leaseholder does not live in the property, but a member of his family occupies the property. The property is located within a complex of other flats which have a communal car park. Access to the communal car park is through electric gates which are operated by fobs issued to the occupants.
  2. On 24 May 202, the leaseholder made a formal complaint about the length of time for which the electric gates had not been working. He stated that because they had been left open it was causing a security problem and that the service charge records for the previous year’s accounts showed that they had been repaired seven times. He stated that complete replacement of the gates would be better value for money. It sent an acknowledgement the next day, but the formal stage 1 written response was not sent until 14 June 2021, fifteen working days after the complaint was made. Its complaints policy states that a response should be sent within ten working days.
  3. In its stage one response, of 14 June 2021, the landlord accepted that there had been service failure regarding the length of time it had taken to get the gates repaired. It confirmed that orders had been placed to get the gates working correctly apologised for this. It contacted the leaseholder by phone the same day as the stage one response to confirm that new gates were to be fitted.
  4. The gates continued to be faulty, and the leaseholder continued to raise the issue with the landlord. The landlord sent its final response on 17 January 2022, seven months after the stage one response. It stated that repair and upgrade works had been completed and the gates were now up to standard and working correctly. There had been a series of component failures and some damage caused to the gates by misuse. It agreed that the service charge did seem high but believed that the costs were justified.
  5. The leaseholder remained dissatisfied about the service in respect of the repairs and stated that there was no evidence of misuse. He also stated that the landlord had not responded to his previous correspondence following a section 20 letter about the increase in service charges.

Assessment and findings

Jurisdiction

  1. What we can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. This is governed by the Housing Ombudsman Scheme. 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, in accordance with paragraphs 42(e) and 42(g) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the following aspects of the complaint are outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction:
    1. The level of the service charge raised by the landlord in respect of the electric car park gate repairs.
    2. The landlord’s handling of the section 20 consultation process.
  3. Paragraph 42(e) of the Scheme states that this Service is unable to consider complaints that concern the level of rent/service charge or the level of any increase. This is a matter for the First Tier Tribunal – Property Chamber (FTT) to consider. The leaseholder has been informed of this and has been advised to take up the level of service charge and its reasonableness with the FTT. Therefore, this report has not assessed the matter of the level of service charge.
  4. Paragraph 42(g) of the Scheme states that if this Service considers it quicker, fairer, more reasonable, or more effective to seek a remedy through the courts, a designated person, other tribunal, or procedure then it will not consider that element of the complaint. The section 20 consultation process is prescribed within the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 and the 2003 service charge regulations. As the First Tier Tribunal (FTT) will consider if the law has been followed in respect of the landlord’s handling of the section 20 process it the leaseholder may wish to consider referring the matter to the FTT.

Repairs to the communal electric car park gates

  1. The gates to the car park were not working in April 2021 and this Service has seen records that show that they were left open by the landlord’s contractor on 5 April 2021. There is no record to show when they were repaired but an inspection report indicates that they were working on 11 May 2021.The leaseholder stated that they had not been working for many weeks. The repairs log and estate inspection records indicate that there was an ongoing problem with the gates and were not working on nine occasions in 2021. Between January 2022 and October 2022, they were not working on six occasions.
  2. The landlord’s contractor noted in its reports that the motors for the gates were not of the correct size for the type of gate that was installed. From the records this Service has seen, this was first noted by the contractor on 9 July 2021 and again on 23 November 2021. There is evidence to show that the gates were at some point working correctly during these months and it is also not clear when new motors were installed.
  3. There is also evidence to show that on some occasions the gates were not working since obstacles such as wheelie bins had been placed in front of the gate sensors so they would not operate correctly. This indicates that the issue was not always due to an actual fault with the gates.
  4. The landlord’s repairs log shows that on most occasions, but not all, when it was notified that the gates were not working it did raise an order with its contractor and they attended in a timely manner. On one occasion there is a record to show that a fault had been reported on 7 February 2022, but this was not actioned by the landlord until ten weeks later on 14 April 2022. Regarding its contractor leaving the gates open on 5 April 2021, there is no record to show when they were working again until an inspection report of 11 May 2021 stated that they were.
  5. In its stage one response the landlord did acknowledge that there had been service failure regarding the length of time it had taken to get the gates working. In its final response it did not state that there had been service failure and stated that it was working with its contractor to improve response times. It confirmed that new motors had been installed and that it had had to deal with a series of component failures.
  6. In considering if there had been any failure by the landlord this Service has carefully considered the records provided, and the comments of the leaseholder. Although there does seem to have been many occasions when the gates were not working, this Service cannot determine what the total time periods of time was when they were not. From the records seen, it appears that on most occasions the landlord did get its contractor to deal with the issue in a timely and appropriate manner. There was however one notification to the landlord which was not actioned for ten weeks.
  7. As the leaseholder does not live at the property the level of adverse impact to him due to the gates not working was not as high as it could have been had he been resident at the property. The main impact upon the leaseholder was the cost of the repairs which has affected the service charge. As stated above the reasonableness of the cost of the repairs is a matter for the FTT.
  8. In consideration of the level of impact on the leaseholder, a finding of maladministration appropriate in respect to the landlord’s handling of the repairs to the gates. This is mainly because of the frequency of the occurrence of the fault with the gates and the fact that it could not provide a long-term solution to the matter sooner. In addition, it did not consider that compensation was warranted with respect to the period when it did not attend to the matter for a significant period and in recognition of its acknowledged service failure. The landlord therefore did not meet its repairing obligations. It is felt appropriate that in recognition of this the landlord gives a formal written apology to the leaseholder and pays compensation of £150 for the inconvenience of the leaseholder chasing it on the matter.

Handling of the complaint.

  1. The leaseholder raised a formal complaint on 24 May 2021, he received an acknowledgement the day after but did not have a response from the landlord within the ten working days that its own procedure requires. He emailed the landlord on the 7 June 2021 to ask why he had not had a response. It was seven days later, on 14 June 2021, when the landlord responded, stating that it was sorry for the delay. It sent its stage one response on the same day, thus, fifteen working days after the complaint was made. Its procedure states that the response should be sent in ten working days. As the landlord acknowledged the delay to its stage one decision and also apologised for this, this Service finds that it responded appropriately to the shortcoming in its handling of the complaint at this stage.
  2. The leaseholder did communicate with the landlord after receiving the stage one response, but this Service has seen no evidence that he asked for his complaint to be escalated to stage two. The correspondence over the months after the stage one response was in respect of the repairs to the gates as well as the section 20 consultation. On 2 November 2021 he contacted this Service asking that the case be investigated. In correspondence between this Service, the landlord and the leaseholder it was clarified that the landlord had not sent a final response. Although it cannot be determined from the records seen, it is clear that the intervention of this Service gave rise to the landlord sending a final response on 17 January 2022.
  3. The landlord’s complaints procedure requires it to provide stage two decisions within 10 workings days of an escalation being requested by the complainant. In the absence of evidence that the leaseholder had requested for the landlord to escalate his complaint, prior to contacting this Service, this report is unable to conclude that he did. It can, therefore, not be concluded that the landlord failed to meet its timescale for sending a final response. Furthermore, the landlord’s stage one response was clear in stating that the leaseholder could request for the escalation of the complaint if they remained dissatisfied. It also provided the timescales for doing so.
  4. However, this Service finds that there was some degree of shortcomings in the landlord’s handling of the complaint at both stages. Firstly, it was not timely in responding to the complaint at the initial stage. Again, it would have been good practice for the landlord to have reminded the leaseholder that he could request for the escalation of his complaint. This is especially so when the frequency of his communication on the issue, after the first decision, is considered. Nonetheless, the impact to the resident was minor at the first stage and it is not clear that he sought an internal escalation of its decision after that stage. Thus, this Service concludes that the landlord’s actions, although below reasonable standards, do not warrant a finding of maladministration with respect to the handling of the complaint.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure in relation to the landlord’s handling of the repairs to the communal electric gate.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 42(e) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the complaint concerning the level of service charge is outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
  3. In accordance with paragraph 42(g) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the complaint concerning the handling of the section 20 consultation is outside of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
  4. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was no maladministration in relation to the landlord’s handling of the complaint.

Orders and Recommendations

Orders

  1. The landlord to provide a formal apology to the leaseholder for its handling of the repairs to the communal electric gate.
  2. The landlord to pay the leaseholder compensation of £150.
  3. The landlord to evidence compliance with the above orders to this Service within 28 days of this investigation report.

Recommendation

  1. That the landlord undertakes refresher training with all its staff about the importance of responding to customers within the time limits set out in its complaint procedure. This should include the consideration of the benefits of being proactive in ensuring that complainants understand how its procedure for complaints is implemented.