The Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code was first introduced in April 2022. All member landlords were asked to comply with the requirements set out in the Code as part of their membership obligations in the Housing Ombudsman Scheme.
Members were given until 1 October 2022 to self-assess against the Code on a ‘comply or explain’ basis, to review its own internal processes and take on the Code as ‘best-practice’ approach to achieve more consistent complaint handling across the sector.
The purpose of the Code was to set out how landlords should handle complaints from residents effectively and fairly to improve its services. The Code was also designed as a guide for residents to provide an understanding of what they could expect from their landlord if they were to make a complaint.
The Code also enabled the Ombudsman to set out when it could intervene in a landlord’s handling of a complaint and provided a clear process for how and when it could instruct a landlord to take on a complaint, provide a response or review its processes or issue an order where there is evidence of complaint handling failure.
The Social Housing Regulation Act (2023) set out that the Ombudsman’s Code would provide a single, robust set of standards for complaints procedures to be accessible, fair and efficient.
In response, the Ombudsman consulted with residents and landlords to revise the 2022 Complaint Handling Code. The new Code was released in February 2024 and became statutory on 1 April 2024.
The Act also placed a legal duty on the Ombudsman to monitor a member's compliance with the Code – regardless of whether a resident brings a complaint to the service.
