Waltham Forest Council (202009252)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202009252

Waltham Forest Council

26 February 2021

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 a request for information about tenancy succession and its subsequent handling of the complaint.

Background and summary of events

Background and policies

2. The resident is a secure tenant of the landlord, at the property, having commenced on a starter tenancy on 18 March 2019.
3. The tenancy agreement states at paragraphs 3.7-3.8, the landlord’s process where the resident dies and the tenancy does not automatically pass to a person qualified by law to succeed to the tenancy. It talks specifically of the process regarding a partner, but does not specify the process in respect of a child, nor define who a person qualified by law is or might be.
4. The landlord’s published ‘Housing Allocation Scheme’ that was in place at the time, states at paragraph 21.1 “The Localism Act 2011 restricted the statutory right of succession to spouses and partners only, unless the local authority decided expressly to include expanded succession rights in its standard secure tenancy agreement. Waltham Forest Council has decided not to expand succession rights in this way. This means that for tenancies granted from 1 April 2012 onwards, different conditions apply for tenancy successions”.
5. Paragraph 21.5 of the same document states “For full details of succession rights for tenancies granted ON or AFTER 1 April 2012, please see Appendix 10”.  ‘Appendix 10’ was not published alongside the document, however and so could not be accessed by the resident.
6. The landlord has a two-stage complaints policy whereby it aims to provide a response to a complaint at stage one within 20 working days and where the resident is dissatisfied with the outcome at stage one and requests escalation of the complaint to stage two, the landlord aims to respond within 25 working days.

Summary of events

7. On 1 April 2020, the resident contacted the landlord about advice she said it had given her in 2019, namely, that her son would automatically succeed the tenancy.  When the resident had checked its ‘Housing Allocation Scheme’, it did not specifically mention that a child would automatically success the tenancy, but instead mentioned a spouse. The landlord’s ‘Housing Allocation Scheme’ made reference to ‘appendix 10’ which explained tenancy succession, which was not on the website. 
8. In her enquiry, the resident asked to receive a copy of this or an explanation as to how a tenancy can be succeeded, stating this was her express intention.  The resident stated that if she was given the incorrect information – which she knew would not have been intentional – she would still like to know how her son could succeed the tenancy.
9. Having not heard from the landlord, on 10 April 2020 the resident chased it for a response to her contact of 1 April 2020, to which it replied on 14 April 2020, advising that due to the Covid-19 outbreak, only emergencies were being responded to and that if it “had time or capacity” while homeworking was in place, it would respond.
10. On 26 April 2020 the resident chased the landlord for a second time, stating that although she understood there was a pandemic, there was no end-date and as such, she would like a response in order to clarify the position on succession. 
11. The following day, the landlord responded, including ‘appendix 11’, which talked of succession by carers and stated that there is more information in the tenancy.  The landlord explained that it could not guarantee anything, however, as the policy could change by the time an application for succession is made.
12. On 28 May 2020 the resident made a complaint to the landlord about it still not having provided her with information about succession, nor was the relevant information published on its website. The resident stated that her request initially was not responded to, then irrelevant information was sent to her after chased (explaining that her son was not her carer).  As resolution to her complaint, the resident asked for a copy of ‘appendix 10’, for ‘appendix 10’ to be published on its website and for the landlord to explain to her what needs to be done in order for her son to succeed the tenancy after her death.
13. On 24 June 2020, the landlord emailed the resident advising that her complaint would be looked into.  Following this the landlord telephoned the resident and agreed to send her a copy of ‘appendix 10’ as well as publishing it on its website.   The landlord has said that it provided the resident with verbal advice as to succession during the telephone call.  The resident had stated that she was advised that her complaint would be responded to at stage one of its complaints procedure within a week. 
14. On an unknown date, the resident requested that her complaint be responded to at stage two of the complaints procedure, stating that her complaint had not been resolved.
15. On 14 August 2020 the landlord responded to the complaint at stage two of its complaints procedure. It upheld the complaint, acknowledging that the delay in sending the resident ‘appendix 10’ was unacceptably lengthy and added that it had originally sent her appendix 11 under the incorrect belief that ‘appendix 10’ had already been sent and that it could not ascertain why it had sent her ‘appendix 11’ given that there was no mention of carers in the resident’s contact with it.
16. The landlord apologised that the complaint was not initially dealt with formally and said that it was in the process of uploading ‘appendix 10’ to its website, so in future, it would be accessible to those who look for it straight away.

Post complaint

17. The landlord did not upload ‘appendix 10’ to its website, instead deciding to wait until its new policy was approved and uploading that instead. It’s new scheme, dated February 2021, is published on the landlord’s website and includes the relevant appendix regarding tenancy succession.

Assessment and findings

18. The landlord did not respond to the resident’s enquiry regarding succession, which led to her chasing the issue ten days later.  It was inappropriate that the landlord did not acknowledge the resident’s request and then having received a follow up email, advised that it would respond if it could.  It was inappropriate because although the Covid-19 crisis meant that landlords were only carrying out emergency repairs and staff were working from home, this did not negate the landlord’s responsibility to respond to notifications, enquiries and complaints; albeit that this may have been a little delayed as a result of the pandemic and subsequent impact. 
19. The landlord’s response of 27 April 2020 in which it provided the incorrect appendix was unhelpful.  Not only was it unhelpful insofar as it provided information which was not relevant to the resident’s enquiry, but it did not attempt to address the resident’s enquiry and concerns around succession and whether and how her son might succeed the tenancy.  Had the landlord done this, this would likely have prevented the complaint that followed.
20. The landlord did not demonstrate that it had heard and understood the enquiry, nor a resolution-focussed approach, in either its response to the resident’s enquiry or her formal complaint, missing an opportunity to put things right at the earliest opportunity. Moreover, the resident was enquiring about the event of her death at a time when there was public anxiety as to health, therefore the resident’s enquiry about securing her son’s future was particularly resonant.  The landlord did not recognise the sensitivity of the timing or the topic at hand.
21. Having made a complaint on 28 May 2020, the landlord was required to respond in accordance with its complaints policy, within 20 working days.  It did not provide a formal response to the complaint at stage one at all, instead telephoning the resident and providing advice over the phone.  Not only was it inappropriate that the landlord did not act in accordance with its policy in this regard but notwithstanding the complaint, it was inappropriate for it to respond to a written enquiry about a specialised matter such as the legal process of succession, verbally. 
22. In not providing a written response, the resident was not given the important information requested in a clear, tangible format, which she could use to refer to, consider and base a decision on.  Further, information provided verbally only, risks miscommunication and misunderstanding and importantly, does not create an audit trail of what was advised. 
23. The landlord has accepted that it delayed in providing ‘appendix 10’, for which it apologised, as well as for the fact it did not respond to the complaint at stage one. It also delayed in responding to the complaint at stage two and overall.
24. In providing a resolution to the complaint, the landlord listened to the outcome requested, which was for it to provide ‘appendix 10’ and to publish this on its website, however, it ultimately did not publish this and in not doing so, damaged trust and confidence in it and its integrity.  The documentation provided to this investigation indicates that the landlord did not publish ‘appendix 10’ because another department (to the complaints department) did not want to invest in updating the website when it was going to be publishing a new scheme a number of months hence.  There is no information that the landlord contacted the resident to explain that it would not be publishing the document or provide any reasons for this. This situation demonstrated a lack of cohesion and joined-upness between teams at the landlord and undermined the complaints process.
25. The landlord did not seek to provide the advice the resident initially asked for in its response to the complaint.  It may have been that providing ‘appendix 10’ was sufficient at this point, however, the landlord did not attempt to ascertain whether the resident understood the situation as to her request for future succession, which given this was the substance of the initial contact, would have been prudent for it to have done. Finally, the landlord, while accepting that it took too long to provide the information, did not seek to demonstrate that it had identified the reason or learning from this; a fundamental aspect of responding to a complaint.

Determination

26. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in respect of the complaint.

Reasons

27. There was service failure by the landlord insofar as it did not respond to the resident’s enquiry and did not commit to responding to it, after the resident chased the matter.  The landlord latterly provided incorrect information to the resident and delayed in providing the correct information once it was re-requested. 
28. The landlord failed to provide a stage one complaint response as required by its complaints policy and was delayed in ultimately responding to the complaint, as well as not fulfilling the complaint outcome as it said it would.

Orders

29. The landlord to pay the resident £100 compensation, comprised of:
    1. £50 for the failings in responding to her request for information, and;
    2. £50 for the failings identified in its handling and response to the complaint.
30. The landlord to carry out a lessons-learned exercise and to carry out any necessary actions, to help prevent a recurrence.  The landlord to provide this Service with evidence that this has been done.