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West Kent Housing Association (202220036)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202220036

West Kent Housing Association

10 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 concerns the level of compensation offered by the landlord following repairs and maintenance to the car park streetlighting.

Background

  1. The resident is a shared owner of the property with the landlord, which is a housing association. The property is a house.
  2. The landlord’s records and repair logs state that it received a report on 10 May 2022 that the lighting in the parking area of the estate was not working. An operative attended on 10 May 2022 and recommend that the bulbs needed changing in all six lampposts in the area. A work order to undertake this work was raised by the landlord on 23 May 2022.
  3. On 23 August 2022, the resident called the landlord and requested to raise a complaint into how it was handling the repairs. The landlord’s notes of the call described the elements of the resident’s complaint as the length of time it was taking the repairs to be completed and that the current condition of car park put her and her family in danger. As a resolution to the complaint, the resident requested that the landlord complete the repairs, refund the service charge for the period the lighting was not working and award further compensation for the stress and inconvenience the matter had caused.
  4. The landlord sent a stage one complaint response to the resident on 7 September 2022 and a stage two complaint response on 20 October 2022. In its responses, the landlord:
    1. Explained that the original target to complete was extended to 6 July 2022 as a specialist electrical contractor was required to complete the work. The landlord also noted that further delays occurred due to staff sickness.
    2. Confirmed that the work was completed on 31 August 2022. One lamppost was still not working after this work, which was repaired on 18 October 2022.
    3. Offered the resident £60 compensation in recognition of the two-week delay in raising the work following the 10 May 2022 inspection of the lampposts and the further delay in arranging a specialist contractor to undertake the work.
  5. An internal landlord email sent on 24 October 2022 noted that another lamppost had stopped working. The contractor determined that this was a different fault than the previous issue of bulb replacement and more extensive repair work would be required. This was marked as completed on 8 November 2022.
  6. In referring the case to this Service, the resident described the outstanding issues of the complaint as the length of time it took the landlord to complete the repairs and the inconvenience that this caused. As a resolution to the complaint the resident requested £444 compensation, which she broke down as £300 for the stress and inconvenience the matter had caused, and £144 to refund the service charge for the four months the repairs were outstanding.

Assessment and findings

Relevant policies and procedures

  1. Sections 3 and 4 of the shared ownership lease sets outs the responsibilities of the leaseholder and the landlord. This states that the landlord is responsible for the maintenance of the communal areas of the estate.
  2. The landlord’s repairs policy categorises its repair types as “Emergency” (respond within 24 hours), “Urgent” (respond within three days) and “Routine” (respond within 21 days). The landlord defines an emergency repair as repair that presents “an immediate risk to your health or security or serious damage to your home”. The policy states that an “unsafe power, lighting or electrical fitting” will be considered an emergency repair and that “faulty electrical fittings and minor electrical faults” will be considered a routine repair.
  3. The landlord’s compensation policy states it will consider offering a discretionary compensation payment in circumstances where there has been “delays in providing a service and unreasonable time taken to resolve a situation”. The policy recommends payments for service failure of minor impact to be up to £100, at moderate impact to be £101 to £250 and severe impact to be £251 to £500.

The level of compensation offered by the landlord following repairs and maintenance to the car park streetlighting

  1. When it was informed by the resident of the issues with the lighting in the car parking area, the landlord had a duty to respond to the issue in line with the obligations set out in the leasehold agreement and its published policies and procedures.
  2. Initially, the landlord responded appropriately to the matter. It arranged an inspection on the same day it received a report. This was appropriate action for it to take as any issues with lighting could be an emergency repair. The inspection determined that the bulbs required replacing in the six lampposts and recommended follow-on work. The follow-on work was classed as routine in line with the guidance given in the landlord’s repairs policy detailed above.
  3. However, there were clearly delays in completing the work following the 10 May 2022 inspection. The follow-on work was not raised on the landlord’s system until 23 May 2022, 13 days after the work was recommended. As the landlord’s existing contractor did not have an operative who was qualified to undertake the work, a specialist was required which resulted in a further delay. An additional delay occurred due to the specialist being ill. Following the completion of this work on 31 August 2022, the landlord received two further reports of faults with the lampposts. These two faults were responded to and repaired within the 21-day timeframe for routine repairs.
  4. Therefore, it was appropriate for the landlord to apologise to the resident, offer compensation and explain what steps it had taken to improve its service. This is in line with the Ombudsman’s Dispute Resolution Principles of: be fair, put things right and learn from outcomes.
  5. The landlord acted fairly in acknowledging its mistakes and apologising to the resident. It put things right by completing the repairs to the lampposts and awarding £60 compensation. It looked to learn from its mistakes by making changes to its contractors. An internal email sent on 30 August 2022 stated that the landlord’s electrical team leader had arranged for an electrical contractor to cover blub replacement to ensure a similar delay in competing the work would not happen in the future.
  6. The £60 compensation offer was made by the landlord at the minor impact tariff of its compensation policy detailed above. This payment is also broadly in line with the Ombudsman’s own remedies guidance (which is available on our website). This recommends a payment of £50 to £100 in cases of service failure of a short duration that may not have significantly affected the overall outcome. This includes distress and inconvenience, time and trouble, disappointment, loss of confidence, and delays in getting matters resolved.
  7. The resident has requested that the service charge be refunded for the four months the repair was outstanding. The landlord has provided a breakdown of the monthly service charge for 2022/23, which totals £36.07, as follows:
    1. 50p for electric for external areas.
    2. £10.04 for grounds and estate maintenance.
    3. £14.15 for buildings insurance.
    4. £11.75 management fee.
    5. 37p credit from the 2020/21 actuals.
  8. It was reasonable for the landlord to decline the request’s request to refund the service charge as only £10.04 of the monthly charge was concerned with maintenance, and covered all the grounds and the estate; not just the lampposts in the car park. Therefore, a payment of £60 that recognised the 13-day delay in raising the work and completing the work 80 days outside of its published target of 21 days for a routine repair was reasonable in the circumstances. The measures taken by the landlord to redress what went wrong were proportionate to the impact that its failures had on the resident.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord made an offer of redress to the resident in respect of the compensation it offered following repairs and maintenance to the car park streetlighting which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, satisfactorily resolves the complaint.

Recommendations

  1. As the finding of reasonable redress was made based on the landlord’s offer of £60 compensation, it is recommended that this is now paid to the resident if the landlord has not done so already.