Major social landlord to pay nearly £11,000 to residents after failings in damp and leak repairs

The Housing Ombudsman has ordered Clarion Housing Association to pay £10,800 in compensation to tenant households after it made four findings of severe maladministration across three cases.

In Case A, the Ombudsman found severe maladministration after the landlord failed to rectify leaks reported by the resident for five years, causing them a high level of distress and inconvenience.

Whilst both tenant and the Ombudsman recognised that leaks can be tricky to fix first time, the Ombudsman concluded that this did not excuse the length of time taken to resolve the issue. Additionally, the resident was forced to spend considerable time and effort chasing for responses and action.

Another reason the landlord used to explain the delay was correspondence with the developer. However, this only happened years after the resident moved into the property and did not account for the majority of the delays experienced.

The Ombudsman uncovered that the landlord also did not appear to manage the resident’s repair consistently or in the same way as it did other reported leaks within the same block, which meant the resident had a vastly different outcome to their neighbours, who had similar issues resolved in a much timelier manner.

This was not appropriate and called into question the landlord’s ability to identify core issues being raised, it found.

Further to this, the offer of compensation within its complaint response was insufficient and a further 12 months passed after this before the leak was finally resolved, compounding the failings.

The Ombudsman ordered the landlord to pay the resident £4,400 in compensation, have a director apologise to the resident and to review how oversight and engagement with third parties could be improved to avoid the inconsistencies in responding to different residents.

In its learning from this case, Clarion said it had taken on new Service Level Agreements which would see that if a contractor or developer doesn’t fix the issue, the landlord will rectify the issue itself and levy costs afterwards.

In Case B, the Ombudsman found two counts of severe maladministration for how the landlord responded to a damp and mould complaint, as well as the associated complaint handling.

The landlord failed to act quickly to the Wimbledon resident’s complaints of damp and mould in both bedrooms and they experienced significant difficulty in getting it to acknowledge concerns about the fabric of the building. It was also observed that the landlord’s responses frequently lacked empathy and put the onus on the resident to change lifestyle.

In addition, although the property was due for regeneration, the landlord was not proactive in seeking resolutions in line with its health and safety obligations and failed to effectively communicate with the resident. There were other complaints from residents in the same block experiencing the same problems. 

Whilst the original appointment for the repairs were made within timescales, it was ruled that the landlord should have thought about attending sooner after the resident explained their children had to move into the living room to escape the mould.

With communication from the landlord to the resident continuing to be poor, they asked their MP for help and described feeling suicidal. The resident was finally decanted and works undertaken to resolve the problem. However, the problems soon returned, with the resident reporting that their home smells of damp and floor tiles are lifting.

This led to the Ombudsman ordering the landlord to inspect and identify any further remedial works required to the residents’ recent reports of damp and mould.

The Ombudsman also said Clarion should apologise in person through a senior member of the landlord’s management team, pay £5,000 in compensation and investigate and respond to the resident’s reports of discrimination and racial bias.

On top of this, it must review whether any further compensation was owed due to the decant and carry out a full review of the case which would include taking into account the Ombudsman’s Spotlight reports on damp and mould and Knowledge and Information Management.

In Case C, the Ombudsman found severe maladministration after the landlord did not take all the steps it could reasonably be expected to take to investigate and resolve the damp and mould issues, causing the Sevenoaks resident and their family significant distress.

The resident has said as a result of this disrepair, they had been unable to use a bedroom and had provided medical evidence referring to their housing situation possibly exacerbating their children’s medical conditions.

Despite Clarion making some attempts to resolve the issue, the Ombudsman held that the fact it remained ongoing for so long meant there was an obvious need to do more. The resident believed the landlord was simply masking the problems rather than dealing with the root cause.

The landlord fitted a new bathroom, undertook an inspection of the drains, reglazed windows and undertook mould washes. An inspection after this found that it was caused by condensation and therefore no further action was required.

After more complaints, the landlord undertook a new survey with environmental health present and found that repairs were required – some of these had been completed but others had not.

The Ombudsman ordered the landlord to appoint an independent external damp and mould specialist to undertake a thorough and rigorous assessment of the property, including the exterior walls and ventilation, pay £1,200 in compensation and assign someone in the organisation to be their single point of contact for all communications.

On top of this, the Ombudsman ordered the landlord to discuss the housing situation with the resident, which may include needing a temporary decant.

In its learning from Case’s B and C, the landlord said it  had developed a new damp and mould strategy which had seen every member of staff undertake damp and mould training.

Richard Blakeway, Housing Ombudsman, highlighted the “extraordinary lengths” residents had to go to for the landlord to take action, which should not have been necessary.

“There is also evidence of the landlord failing to join the dots or having similar points of failure, especially in the cases where there were multiple related complaints from the same block," he said.

“Running throughout these cases is evidence of delay, poor communication and ineffective action. There were multiple instances in these cases where it would not have been too late to rectify the situation for the resident and repair the relationship between them and the landlord. However, these opportunities were also missed."

Blakeway said that complaints about leaks, damp and mould had increased significantly in the past year and these cases showed where landlords could make decisive changes to improve their service for residents.

“With the wet weather and storms impacting homes over the festive period, we are urging landlords to take any reports of leaks and damp seriously, take responsive action and ensure residents feel they are being treated with respect and empathy.”

Clarion Housing Association, in its learning statement, apologised to the residents in all three of these cases for the shortcomings in the service provided to them.

“We have complied with the Ombudsman’s orders in each case, and we have gone to lengths to consider what we can learn from these cases to continuously improve. In the damp and mould cases, while we took steps to address the issue, there were delays and we were not always consistent in keeping the residents updated. Ultimately, it took too long to resolve the problem and we understand the impact this will have had on the households.”

Clarion accepted that it was not acceptable to blame lifestyle, defined by the statement as “normal household activities”, as the cause of damp and mould, and asserted its commitment to taking responsibility and doing all possible to support residents in managing the issue while the root cause is identified and fixed.

These cases predated the acceleration of its new damp and mould strategy, it added. Clarion also reported that a new approach had seen every member of staff undertake damp and mould training, so that reports are dealt with promptly and sensitively.

Harry Rodd