Housing association fined after leaving family in ‘dangerous and unacceptable conditions’

The Housing Ombudsman has found severe maladministration for housing association A2Dominion after ‘significant failures’ in complaint handling left a mother and her family living in ‘dangerous and unacceptable conditions’, despite pressure from the Ombudsman and politicians.

The Ombudsman also found maladministration for issues relating to the poor state of temporary accommodation and damp and mould in the home, which were unresolved for nearly two years.

The resident has mental health issues and some of her children are also vulnerable – one is disabled and has a developmental learning disorder.

The landlord’s failures occurred from the start, as it treated the dissatisfaction from the South London resident as a service request rather than a complaint. Following this, the landlord then failed to address all of the concerns within the complaint.

The Ombudsman said that given the gravity of the situation, A2Dominion should have proactively raised a complaint to ensure its records were accurate. This may have helped ensure it addressed each of the resident’s concerns accordingly.

Over 14 months, the resident consistently said the landlord either closed unresolved complaints or failed to respond altogether, leaving her and her family in a home that had rotten window frames and severe mould in the children’s bedrooms.

In the second part of the complaint, the landlord failed to keep the resident informed and updated about an additional investigation that was needed and failed to acknowledge its stage two response was delayed.

The Ombudsman ordered A2Dominion to pay the resident £5,700 in compensation, review its decant policy and review its complaint policies to ensure they are compliant with the Complaint Handling Code.

In its learning from the case, A2Dominion said it has strengthened its damp and mould taskforce as well as made changes to its stage two responses to improve the process.

Housing Ombudsman Richard Blakeway said: ‘It was wholly unacceptable that the resident was prevented from addressing serious concerns through the landlord’s internal complaints process.

‘Ultimately, despite intervention from third parties, she failed to attain appropriate redress until around 23 months after the decant. This will have caused significant distress and inconvenience to the family.

“Ultimately, the landlord failed to consider awarding appropriate redress at any point during the complaint journey.

‘I am seeing too many examples of landlords not taking valid complaints into their procedure and it is critical, given the intention for the Complaint Handling Code to become statutory, for landlords to ensure its approach meets the standards.’

The Ombudsman found maladministration for how the landlord dealt with the damp and mould issues at the property, as well as how it handled a temporary decant.

On the decant, A2Dominion failed to ensure the resident’s welfare during the process or redress the distress and inconvenience arising from its failure. The landlord failed to mitigate damp and mould within the home and left issues running for 21 months.

In its learning statement, A2Dominion apologised for its failings. ‘Repair work has since been completed at our customers home, and we have carried out further inspections to make sure these issues are not repeated.’

Image: Bruno Guerrero