Agenda item

The report will follow in a supplementary pack for this meeting after it has been published for the meeting of Executive Committee (due for publication on Monday 2 June).

The Strategic Housing and Business Support Manager presented the Housing Ombudsman Self-Assessment Complaint Handling Code for Members’ consideration. It was clarified that this report was incorrectly titled on the agenda as ‘Housing Regulator Complaint Handling Code’ with the correct title being the ‘Housing Ombudsman Complaint Handling Code’.

Members were informed that there was a requirement for the Council, as a social housing provider, to adopt the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaints Handling Code. There was a further requirement for the Council to undertake a self-assessment in line with the code. Following the latest self-assessment, Officers had identified that there was a need to provide greater clarity with regard to Stage 2 complaints, particularly with regard to the types of complaints which would not be accepted as complaints at this stage. The report provided an opportunity to update the Code and Members were being invited to consider this change.

Officers reported that in 2024-25 the Council received 124 complaints which was a rate of 22.37 complaints per 1,000 social housing properties. This compared to the median rate across social housing properties of 42.5. Officers needed to fully understand and audit the reasons behind the Council’s relatively low complaints rate, whether it was because of improvements to the service, because tenants were unsure how they could make a complain, or due to a combination of these factors.

It was noted that in the first quarter of 2024-25 the Council’s performance in regard to complaint response times had deteriorated. The performance in this area had been improving since then and to drive improvement in the complaints handling performance a dedicated complaints investigator had been introduced within Housing Property Services.

Question was raised by a Member about what the Council did to foster a sense of trust with those tenants whose complaints were upheld by the Ombudsman. In particular, reference was made to a long-standing complaint with events dating back to 2015, where maladministration was found in the Council’s handling of the case. The Officer responded with reference to upheld complaints that the Council worked to immediately acknowledge all cases where mistakes were made, and discuss learning outcomes with staff and contractors to address issues. In referring to the particular case dating back to 2015, the Officer commented that this was an extremely complex case where the Council had found itself out of time to appeal and therefore had to accept the Ombudsman’s determinations. As a result of this case a number of significant improvements to the Council’s complaint handling were made including a new Housing Allocations System, digitialisation of historic paper files for improved record keeping, and enhanced training opportunities through the Housing Quality Network for key members of staff 

The Vice-Chair addressed the Committee and commended Officers and the Housing Portfolio Holder for the continuing progress made in this service area. He noted that in 2018 the Housing Service was in turmoil and there were no statistics recorded at that time but since then significant efforts had been made to get to the point where data including complaints and tenant satisfaction data was fully recorded.

The recommendations contained in the report were endorsed by the Committee.

RECOMMENDED that

1)    The Housing Complaint Self-Assessment (Appendix 1) is approved.

2)    Annual Complaints Performance and Service Improvement Report 2024-25 (Appendix 2) is approved.

3)    The Housing Complaints Standard (Appendix 3) is approved.

4)    Note that the reports referred to at resolutions 1 to 3 above will be published to the Council’s website.