Regulator sees 15% increase in complaint referrals
The English social housing regulator has seen a 15% increase in the number of consumer standard referrals compared to last year.
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Consumer standard referrals can be made to the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) by an authority such as an MP, a councillor, the Housing Ombudsman or the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
In a review of its consumer standards regulation, the HCA said it received 532 referrals in 2016/17, a 15% increase on the previous year.
Out of these referrals 105 were investigated and seven led to the regulator ruling that there had been a breach – three more than last year.
The regulator said it “acknowledges” that its report will be read in the context of the Grenfell Tower fire and that it will be “important” for providers to respond to the conclusions of the public inquiry and police and fire investigations.
The HCA said where providers breach a consumer standard their systems are often “poorly designed, poorly implemented, or both”.
Here are details of the seven providers that breached a consumer standard in 2016/17:
- St Vincent’s Housing Association – failed to act on a large number of high priority fire safety actions from fire risk assessments. The regulator downgraded the association’s governance to G2. Once changes were made by the board, the association was upgraded again to G1.
- Circle – the regulator said Circle had “chronic and long-standing difficulties” with its repairs and maintenance service. Numerous tenants and local MPs complained to the regulator. The provider has now merged with Affinity Sutton to form Clarion Housing Group.
- Luminus – downgraded to a non-compliant G3 after the regulator found more than 1,000 properties had not had a valid gas safety certificate for at least some part of the previous two years. Following the downgrade, chief executive Chan Abraham resigned and Luminus is now in merger talks with Places for People.
- Paradigm Housing Group – a number of properties were without valid gas safety certificates, some for a number of years.
- Manningham Housing Association – the association did not have a “robust” system in place to maintain gas fittings and flues. This was discovered by the HSE but the association did not report it to the regulator. It was downgraded to a non-compliant G3.
- Tower Hamlets Community Housing – Hundreds of fire safety actions were not implemented and some had been outstanding for more than two years. It was downgraded to a non-compliant G3.
- Expectations – properties did not meet the Decent Homes Standard and there were fire safety concerns.