Westminster Community Homes Limited (202101251)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202101251

Westminster Community Homes Limited

19 August 2021

Our approach

What we can and cannot consider is called the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction and is governed by the Housing Ombudsman Scheme. The Ombudsman must determine whether a complaint comes within their jurisdiction. The Ombudsman seeks to resolve disputes wherever possible but cannot investigate complaints that fall outside of this. 

In deciding whether a complaint falls within their jurisdiction, the Ombudsman will carefully consider all the evidence provided by the parties and the circumstances of the case.

The complaint

1. The complaint is about the resident’s requests for compensation from the landlord for excessive energy costs since the start of her tenancy.

Determination (jurisdictional decision)

2. 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.
3. After carefully considering all the evidence, we have determined that the complaint, as set out above, is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.

Summary of events

4. The resident is a tenant of the landlord. Her tenancy began in August 2015. The landlord changed the heating and hot water electric meter in September. The resident pays the landlord for heating and hot water as a service charge included in her rent. She has another electric meter in her home. She pays her energy provider for it.
5. The resident raised a formal complaint to the landlord on 20 March 2017. She said that since the landlord had changed the meter, her electricity bill had increased. The landlord issued its stage one complaint response on 29 March. It said it would organise an appointment to test her electrical system.
6. On 19 July 2017 the resident asked the landlord for compensation for her high electricity costs, and reimbursement for her service charges. The landlord formally responded on 7 August. It said it would arrange another appointment to check the electrical wiring, and then consider her request. It asked her to confirm her availability. It advised how she could escalate her complaint if she remained dissatisfied.
7. The resident responded to the landlord on 8 August 2017. She said she did not believe it had properly considered her complaint, that she believed the cause of the problem was known and was due to an incorrect electrical setup by the landlord when she started her tenancy, and that she could no longer provide access for further investigations during the week, because of her work commitments. She asked the landlord to escalate her complaint, and said that, otherwise, she would contact this Service.
8. The landlord explained to the resident on 9 August 2017 that it had tried to accommodate her request for weekend appointments, but could not do so, and that it needed to conduct further testing before it could agree to escalate her complaint.
9. The resident emailed the landlord on 23 October 2017. She said her bills were still too high and that she had not yet been reimbursed or compensated. She said she had heard nothing more from it since August.
10. No evidence has been provided of further correspondence or activity by the landlord or resident until March 2020, when the resident sent the landlord utility statements. The landlord’s internal documents for April 2020 state that the resident was still raising her concerns about her high energy costs, and that part of the compensation she was seeking was for costs for the entirety of her tenancy since 2015.
11. The resident raised another formal complaint to the landlord in December 2020 about the same issues. She reiterated her request for compensation and reimbursement. The landlord issued its stage one complaint response on 8 January 2021. It said it had attended on 4 January 2021, and found it needed to install a timer switch (which is completed in February). It said it was investigating whether she was due a refund.
12. The resident escalated her complaint on 2 February 2021. The landlord issued its stage two complaint response on 9 April. It said in January it found that her immersion heater had been constantly running. It said it had reviewed the bills she provided, and calculated that she had paid an additional £18 per month because of the immersion heater. It offered her £1188 compensation. This was backdated to the start of her tenancy (66 months).  

Reasons

13. Paragraph 39(e) of the Scheme states that the Ombudsman will not consider complaints that “were not brought to the attention of the landlord as a formal complaint within a reasonable period, which would normally be within six months of the matters arising”.
14. The resident raised a formal complaint to the landlord in March 2017 about her electricity costs, and asked for reimbursement in July 2017. After some initial correspondence between the resident and landlord up to October 2017, the issue appears to have lapsed. The evidence shows the resident raised the same matters again in late 2020, at least three years after she had become aware of the issue, and was seeking similar compensation for the period of her tenancy.
15. The Ombudsman encourages residents to raise complaints with their landlords in a timely manner, so that the landlord has a reasonable opportunity to consider the issues whilst they are still ‘live’, and whilst the evidence is available to reach an informed conclusion on the events which occurred. It is clear that the resident did raise a complaint in 2017, and also that she asked for it to be escalated after the landlord’s first complaint response, which the landlord declined until it could conduct further inspections. There is then no evidence of further complaints or escalations for several years. Because of that, and particularly because the matters raised in 2020 were strongly linked to the same issues from 2017 and earlier, in line with paragraph 39(e), this is not a complaint that the Ombudsman will consider.
16. In making this determination we have not sought to comment on the merits or validity of the resident’s complaint, or the landlord’s actions or complaint handling, only that the substance of this complaint is too old to investigate.