Notting Hill Genesis (NHG) (202206159)

REPORT

COMPLAINT 202206159

Notting Hill Genesis

12 July 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. This complaint comprises two separate complaints raised to the landlord. Both have been considered in this report as they are related.
2. The first complaint raised to the landlord was about allegations of appointments which were not attended to as expected.
3. The second complaint was about:
   1. The landlord’s response to reports of overgrown shrubbery at the resident’s property.
   2. An unexpected service charge on the resident’s rent account.
   3. The landlord’s handling of the first complaint and payment of compensation.

Background

4. The resident is an assured tenant of the landlord. They occupy a one-bedroom ground floor flat. The resident is a wheelchair user. Their flat has been adapted for them by the landlord.
5. The resident first raised concerns to the landlord on 21 February 2022. They told the landlord:
   1. A contractor failed to attend two appointments in relation to a gas safety check.
   2. Their housing officer failed to attend a planned meeting at their home.

The resident requested £90 compensation in respect of three missed appointments.

6. The landlord responded to the resident to explain that it had spoken to its contractor who confirmed that both appointments were attended. Its contractor said that on the first occasion, the operative was informed by the resident that the safety check was no longer required. On the second occasion, the contractor said that the resident was in the shower and could not grant access. The landlord also said that it did not compensate for missed housing officer appointments. The landlord told the resident it was closing their complaint.
7. On 23 February 2022, the resident wrote to the landlord to escalate the complaint to stage 2 of the landlord’s procedure. The resident also logged two further complaints in respect of the missed appointments. The landlord told the resident that it would need to send a written response to stage 1 before the resident could escalate the complaint.
8. On 14 March 2022, the landlord sent its stage 1 response in the form of a letter. That letter has not been provided to this Service, however the notes suggest that the landlord did not uphold the complaint. This was because the contractor did not agree that the appointments were missed. The landlord also explained that it did not compensate for missed housing officer appointments.
9. The resident escalated the complaint to stage 2 as they were unhappy with this response. They explained that the contractor did not attend the first appointment. They also said that the contractor was asked to wait for the resident to exit the shower on the second appointment but declined to do so.
10. The landlord sent its stage 2 response to the resident on 26 May 2022. In that response it:
    1. Apologised for the delay in responding to the complaint.
    2. Explained that it did not consider the contractor’s appointments to be “missed”.
    3. Apologised for failing to inform the resident, on the day of the meeting with the housing officer, that the meeting would not go ahead due to absence.
    4. Offered £250 compensation broken down as:
       1. £100 for the delayed response to the complaint.
       2. £50 for failing to communicate in respect of the meeting with the housing officer.
       3. £100 for stress and inconvenience in raising the complaint.
11. The landlord told the resident that the payment would be made on 1 June 2022. The resident wrote several emails chasing the payment. On 24 June 2022, the resident told the landlord that if payment was not made the same day, they would expect to be compensated £50 for each day the compensation was delayed.
12. The landlord spoke to the resident on 13 July 2022. Payment was made to the resident’s rent account, however the resident wanted to raise a further complaint. The new complaint was about:
    1. Overgrown shrubbery at the resident’s home.
    2. A service charge being applied to the resident’s rent account.
    3. The landlord’s handling of the previous complaint and payment.
13. The landlord acknowledged the new complaint on 19 July 2022. However, the complaint was not logged on their internal system until 1 August 2022. The landlord sent its stage 1 response to that complaint on 11 August 2022. That response said:
    1. It would remove the shrubbery and pave the area.
    2. The service charges were new, and a letter was sent to residents in February 2022 which explained the reason for charging them.
    3. It apologised for the delay in handling this complaint and the delay in providing the previous compensation. It offered the resident £50 as compensation for the failures it identified.
14. The resident asked to escalate the complaint as there was no explanation of when the work on the shrubbery would be completed. They also said they were the only resident paying service charges and the £50 compensation was insufficient. The resident followed up the escalation on 23 August 2022 as they did not receive a response.
15. The landlord sent its final response to the resident on 22 September 2022. It said that it had notified the resident of the service charges in December 2021. It accepted that it had received a communication from the resident in respect of the service charges but had not responded. It waived a proportion of the charges up to the date of the final response. It upheld the complaint and offered a further £300 compensation. This was broken down as:
    1. £100 in respect of the delay in responded to the complaint.
    2. £50 in respect of the delay in paying previous compensation.
    3. £50 for the delay in dealing with the works to the shrubbery.
    4. £100 as an apology for poor communication with the resident.
16. The resident is unhappy with the response from the landlord. The resident was offered £550 in compensation but has claimed that they are owed £2,150 in compensation as a result of the delay to the previous payment.

Assessment and findings

Missed appointments

17. The landlord’s compensation policy says that it will compensate £30 per missed repair appointment. There is no specific policy in relation to other missed appointments. When the resident raised the complaint in respect of the appointments, the landlord contacted the contractor to confirm if the allegations were true. It was found that the contractors did attend on both occasions it was alleged they had not.
18. The resident disputed that the contractors had attended on the first occasion, however, it was reasonable for the landlord to rely on its contractors’ account of events. On the second occasion the contractors said that they could not wait for the resident to grant access as they were exceptionally busy. It appears that the contractors scheduled the appointment for a five-hour window, rather than a specific time. Considering the resident is a wheelchair user and may not have been easily able to grant access, it would have been reasonable for the contractors to allow extra time for the resident’s appointment. The appointment was rescheduled a second time and it is understood that no further disruption was experienced. This means the impact on the resident was likely to be minimal.
19. In respect of the missed housing officer appointment, the landlord told the resident that it should have let the resident know of the absence within 24 hours and apologised. When the landlord responded under its “quick fix” approach it explained that its policy meant that no payment was due. We are concerned that the landlord adopted such an inflexible approach to the complaint, and it should have considered the effect on the resident prior to making the decision. Requiring the resident to challenge this response would have caused unnecessary distress and inconvenience. However, we are pleased that the landlord did acknowledge this failing in its final response, offering £250 in recognition of this. The compensation award was in line with its own policy and what we would consider reasonable redress in the circumstances.

Shrubbery work

20. The resident originally contacted the landlord to cut back the shrubbery as they were unable to do so. After an inspection and considering the resident’s vulnerability the landlord decided to remove the shrubbery and pave the area. We can see from the communications with the resident that there was a delay initially in arranging the work as the member of staff dealing with it had left the organisation. The landlord cut down the shrubbery after a couple of months and, at the point of resolving the complaint, had not yet paved the area. We understand this has now been done.
21. We can see that the landlord did contact the resident on a number of occasions to apologise for the delay. We would not consider the work urgent, as it was outside the building and was likely to have minimally affected the resident’s enjoyment of their home. While the delay was unreasonable, the actions the landlord took and the £50 compensation offered for the delay was reasonable.

Service charges

22. It is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction to decide if service charges are fair and reasonable. That is for the First Tier Tribunal (Property Chamber). However, we can look at whether the landlord communicated reasonably with the resident in respect of the service charge. The tenancy agreement does allow for the increase of the service charge in line with relevant legislation. The service charges related to a fire risk assessment the landlord conducted every two years. Although it had completed this assessment in previous years, it did not recover the costs from the residents until now.
23. The resident challenged the service charge when they received notification that it would be charged. The landlord should have recognised that this challenge required a response. It was not until the landlord sent its stage 2 response that it recognised it had failed to respond. As a result, it agreed to waive any service charges accrued to the date of its response. This was good practice and reasonable in the circumstances. In its final response, the landlord also recognised errors in communication and compensated accordingly.
24. The resident believes that they are the only tenant being charged service charges. The landlord disputes this and said that all tenants in the block were informed of the changes to the service charges at the same time as the resident. There is no evidence that other tenants are not paying service charges. However, in respect of this report, we can only determine if the landlord has treated this resident fairly. We believe it has.

Complaint handling

25. The landlord’s complaints policy outlines how it intends to deal with complaints. At stage 1 of the landlord’s policy there are two timescales:
    1. Within 2 working days the landlord can close the complaint as a “quick fix” if the resident agrees.
    2. Otherwise, the landlord should respond within 10 working days.

At stage 2 the landlord says that it expects to resolve complaints within 20 working days.

26. Across the two complaints there were delays in responding to the resident on several occasions. The first complaint was logged on 21 February 2022 and the first response sent on 14 March 2022. In addition, the landlord told the resident it had originally closed the complaint as a quick fix, despite not have the resident’s agreement. This was poor practice and led to the resident logging duplicate complaints. When the resident escalated their complaint to stage 2, it took a further two months to respond.
27. When the landlord did respond at stage 2, it accepted that the delays were unreasonable. We are pleased that the landlord accepted these failings and intended to take steps to learn from them. In addition to the £50 compensation offered for the missed appointment, it offered the resident a further £200 related to the delays and distress and inconvenience.
28. The landlord told the resident that it would make the payment to the resident’s rent account upon request. Over the next 6 weeks there were repeated emails between the landlord and the resident. The payment was not made in a timely manner and the resident was clearly frustrated by this. The resident told the landlord that they intended to charge them £50 per day it was not paid and would seek court action to ensure payment.
29. The landlord did eventually make payment, but the resident remained insistent that a further £2,150 was due for the delay. The resident requested this on several occasions. In one email, the landlord acknowledges the request saying it would pass details to its finance team. This caused confusion and the resident seemed to consider this an acceptance of the request. It later offered £50 in total as compensation for the delay and said nothing further was owed.
30. Although the delay was unjustified, we do not agree that £2,150 is due. The landlord should not have indicated that it would make that payment, but in its final response it explained its position to the resident and offered reasonable compensation.
31. The second complaint was received by the landlord on 13 July 2022, the same date as payment was made. However, the landlord failed to log the complaint on its internal systems until 1 August 2022. This meant that a response was not sent to the resident until 11 August 2022, four weeks later. When the resident escalated their complaint on the same day it appears that the escalated complaint was also not logged correctly. This meant the landlord did not respond to the complaint until 22 September 2022, nearly six weeks after it was escalated.
32. This delay was unreasonable, and the landlord should consider how to ensure that complaints do not become “lost” once they are received. In its final response, the landlord accepted that it had made errors in managing the complaint. We are concerned that the intended learnings the landlord promised in the first complaint did not seem to have happened. We would encourage the landlord to reflect on this and ensure they take these learnings seriously in future.
33. The landlord offered a total of £450 in respect of poor complaint handling. Considering the level of failings identified by this report, we consider that this offer is in line with the Housing Ombudsman’s guidelines. Therefore, we believe that there has been reasonable redress.

Determination

34. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme we have determined that the landlord offered reasonable redress in respect of the missed appointments.
35. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme we have determined that the landlord offered reasonable redress in respect of the delay in completing the shrubbery work.
36. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme we have determined that the landlord offered reasonable redress in respect of the service charges.
37. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Housing Ombudsman Scheme we have determined that the landlord offered reasonable redress in respect of the complaint handling.

Orders and recommendations

Recommendations

38. The landlord should review its policy for managing complaints to ensure that complaints are logged, acknowledged, and responded to in a timely manner. It should share this report with relevant staff to support this review.
39. The landlord should consider whether to instruct its contractors to allow extra time for visits to vulnerable residents. This is to ensure they are not disadvantaged where they are not able to grant access as quickly as other residents.