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Metropolitan Thames Valley Housing (202122065)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202122065

Metropolitan Thames Valley Housing

6 September 2022


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 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:
    1. The resident’s reports of faulty television aerial sockets.
    2. The associated complaint.

Background

  1. The resident is a tenant of the landlord of a flat.
  2. On 22 April 2021, the resident reported to the landlord that she had no signal to her television. On 27 April 2021, a contractor attended her property and identified a “problem” with a communal aerial. On 11 May 2021, the landlord informed the resident that, after its contractor had attended the property again on 4 May 2021, the aerial was not a communal aerial, but was for her use only, and therefore it would not be responsible for repairing this.
  3. On 16 May and 1 July 2021, the resident made stage one and final stage complaints to the landlord, respectively, about its response to her television aerial repair request. She stated that it was noted during the contractor’s visit that two aerial sockets in the property were found not to be working. After visiting another property in the building, the contractor identified that no aerial sockets were working in the building. Therefore, the landlord’s stance that it was not a communal aerial was “totally incorrect”.
  4. The resident felt that she was being treated in an “irresponsible manner” due to her “skin colour”. She also raised concerns about the landlord’s staff members being “rude and sarcastic” to her when she contacted it about this, which caused her additional “stress” that had worsened her mental health conditions and caused her doctor to increase her medication.
  5. The landlord’s stage one and final stage complaint responses of 28 May and 6 September 2021, respectively, stated that it acknowledged a delay in it finding the cause of the lack of television aerial signal issues after over a month, and it attributed this to an “unusual” shared aerial, which was not common. It confirmed that it would therefore install an individual aerial in the property to help with the connection, which it subsequently fitted on 11 June 2021. The landlord apologised for the inconvenience caused to the resident by its repair delays and lack of updates about this, and it offered her £90 compensation consisting of £40 for her time and trouble and £50 for its failure of service.
  6. The resident subsequently referred this matter to this Service because she stated that the issues surrounding the television aerial had affected her mental health, and she felt that the level of compensation offered was “disproportionate to the level of stress suffered”. She therefore requested £200 compensation from the landlord, considering the “stress” endured from it taking two months and three appointments to repair one aerial socket in her lounge without restoring her bedroom’s socket. The resident instead believed that it should have installed two television aerial sockets in the property, and she reported that television usually calmed her mental health conditions.
  7. The landlord then contacted this Service and acknowledged a complaint handling failure in the case, as it had not addressed the concerns about its staff’s behaviour, offering an additional £25 compensation to the resident for this. It added that it was unaware of her vulnerabilities or that the television aerial socket issue had not been fully resolved, and so it agreed to inspect and repair this on 28 July 2022.
  8. This Service subsequently contacted the resident, to enquire if she would like to accept the new total compensation offer of £115. However, she rejected the landlord’s increased compensation offer, as she felt that this was not “enough” in consideration of the impact that the repair delays had on her mental health, for which she requested £150 compensation instead. The resident also reported further concerns about its staff’s behaviour, and she explained that it had told her that it could not repair the television aerial socket in her bedroom, as this was connected to the faulty communal aerial, before agreeing to wait for approval for this.


Assessment and findings

Scope of investigation

  1. The resident has stated that the lack of television and the landlord’s actions in her case affected her mental health. The Ombudsman does not doubt her comments about her mental health, however it is beyond the authority or expertise of this Service to determine liability or award damages for ill-health in the way that a court or insurer might, and we are unable investigate complaints where the resident is seeking an outcome that is not within our authority to provide. The Ombudsman has therefore made no findings in relation to this. Nonetheless, consideration has been given to the general distress and inconvenience which the situation may have caused the resident.

Policies and procedures

  1. The landlord’s repairs guide for tenants states that a routine repair should be completed within 28 calendar days. Its compensation policy awards up to £50 to residents for low failures of its service and their time and trouble, and up to £150 for medium failures and time and trouble, for which it can also compensate them for poor complaint handling on its part, including poor communication and incorrectly investigating a complaint. The landlord’s complaints policy states that a stage one complaint response should be provided within ten working days, and that a final stage response should be provided within 20 working days.

Faulty television aerial sockets handling

  1. It is not disputed by either party that there were failings in the way the landlord dealt with the resident’s report of faulty television aerial sockets. Its repairs guide for tenants states that it should complete such routine repairs within 28 calendar days. The resident reported this repair to the landlord on 22 April 2021, and it attended the property for this on 27 April and 4 May 2021, both of which were in line with the guide’s 28-calendar-day timescale. However, it did not complete the repair to the socket in her lounge until 11 June 2021, which was 50 calendar days after the repair was reported, and the repair to the socket in her bedroom remains outstanding.
  2. While the landlord did not repair the television aerial signal to the resident’s lounge until 50 calendar days later, it was fair in trying to put right this failing. This is because it completed the repair in the belief that this was fully resolved at the time, and it provided a proportionate amount of compensation to the resident for the delay.
  3. The landlord also learnt from the outcome of the resident’s case, as it identified that the communal aerial was an “unusual” repair, which subsequently caused repair delays, before it resolved this by installing an individual aerial to improve the connection. Therefore, it acted in line with this Service’s dispute resolution principles and tried to put right its failings and learn from the outcome of the case.
  4. The landlord offered £90 compensation to the resident in recognition of the inconvenience caused by the delay to the repair of her lounge television aerial socket, which consisted of £40 for her time and trouble and £50 for its failure of service. This was reasonable, as it recognised the delay in repairing the faulty socket and the inconvenience that this would have caused the resident with an award that accorded with its compensation policy’s recommendations for low failures. The delay was also not significantly outside of the landlord’s repairs timeframe, and was an unusual repair, which in turn caused delays.
  5. This compensation offer is also in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance, which suggests awards from £50 for failures where there may be no permanent impact on the resident. This includes the repeated failure to meaningfully engage with the substance of the complaint, or failing to address all relevant aspects of complaint, leading to considerable delay in resolving the complaint. Although it is of concern that the resident continues to report that her bedroom television aerial socket has still not been repaired, which is therefore addressed below.

Associated complaint handling

  1. The landlord also identified failings on its part in relation to the resident’s complaint during the complaints procedure. Its complaints policy states that it should provide a stage one and final stage complaint responses within ten and 20 working days, respectively. However, while the landlord’s stage one response of 28 May 2021 was within ten working days of the stage one complaint of 16 May 2021, it did not provide a final stage response to the resident’s final stage complaint of 1 July 2021 until 6 September 2021. This was 46 working days later, which was 26 working days outside of the complaints policy’s 20-working-day timescale, and therefore it did not act in line with its policy.
  2. Moreover, the landlord did not meaningfully engage with all of the aspects of the resident’s complaint or address all of the concerns that she was raising in her complaints. These included her reports of two television aerial sockets not working in her property, the allegations of poor staff behaviour and discrimination towards her by them, and her reports of these and its repair delays affecting her mental health. The incomplete responses from the landlord that did not respond to or mention these issues would have unnecessarily caused the resident further distress and inconvenience, which was unsuitable.
  3. This also impacted this Service’s investigation into the resident’s complaint, as we cannot confirm the allegations made her without an investigation into these by the landlord, and we additionally cannot determine if it acted appropriately in its handling of these allegations. Therefore, it did not handle the complaint appropriately and so, to resolve this matter, it has been ordered below to do the following. The landlord has been ordered to contact the resident to arrange to repair her bedroom’s television aerial socket, address her outstanding concerns about its staff’s behaviour, and provide her with its insurance team’s details to enable her to submit a liability insurance claim to it for damages for the effect of this on her mental health.
  4. It is acknowledged that the landlord offered the resident an additional £25 compensation for its poor complaint handling, reflecting a low failure on its part under its compensation policy. However, in all the circumstances of her case, this offer is not proportionate to remedy the detriment caused to her by all of its complaint handling failings. Given the compensation policy’s recommendation for £51 to £150 for medium failures and the resident’s request for £150 total compensation, the landlord has been ordered below to pay this to her by increasing its complaint handling award to her of £25 to £60 compensation, as this is appropriate to recognise the distress and inconvenience caused to her.
  5. This compensation offer is also in line with the Ombudsman’s remedies guidance, which suggests awards from £50 for failures where there may be no permanent impact on the resident. An example of this is repeated failure to meaningfully engage with the substance of the complaint, or failing to address all relevant aspects of complaint, leading to considerable delay in resolving the complaint. In light of the landlord’s failure to do so, it has also been recommended below to review its staff’s training needs in relation to complaint handling, as well as its record keeping processes for residents’ vulnerabilities, given the resident’s reports to it about her mental health conditions and its lack of records of her vulnerabilities.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 55(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, the landlord has offered redress to the resident prior to investigation which, in the Ombudsman’s opinion, resolves the complaint regarding its handling of her reports of faulty television aerial sockets satisfactorily.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 54 of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme, there was service failure by the landlord in way that it handled the associated complaint.

Orders and recommendations

  1. The landlord is ordered to:
    1. Pay the resident £150 total compensation within four weeks, which is broken down into the £115 already offered to her by it plus a further £35 in recognition of its poor complaints handling.
    2. Contact the resident within four weeks to arrange to repair her bedroom’s television aerial socket.
    3. Investigate and respond to the resident’s allegations of discrimination and poor staff behaviour towards her by its staff within four weeks.
    4. Provide the resident with its insurance team’s details within four weeks to enable her to submit a liability insurance claim to it for damages for the effect of its failings in her case on her mental health.
  2. It is recommended that the landlord:
    1. Review its staff’s training needs in relation to their application of its complaints policy and the Ombudsman’s complaint handling code to ensure that they fully address every aspect of a complaint in every case.
    2. Review its record keeping processes for residents’ vulnerabilities to ensure that it records their reports of these to it in every case.
  3. The landlord shall contact this Service within four weeks to confirm that it has complied with the above orders, and whether it will follow the above recommendations.