Local Government Ombudsman

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Complaints about harassment by your landlord

This fact sheet is aimed primarily at tenants who cannot get any help from the council about the problems they are experiencing with their landlord and may be considering making a complaint to the Ombudsman.

I am being harassed by my landlord and I am unhappy that the council has done nothing about it. Can the Ombudsman help me?

  • In most circumstances we can help you. But, once the council has started legal proceedings against the landlord we have no power to investigate the way the council started the court action or the way it dealt with the court case. Despite this, we can consider the way the council dealt with the situation in the period before it started the legal proceedings.
  • Councils have the power to prosecute private landlords if they (or other people acting on behalf of the landlord) do anything likely to interfere with the peace or comfort of tenants or any other person occupying the property. This covers a wide range of actions from threats and illegal eviction to less direct action such as disconnecting electricity if the actions are intended to cause unreasonable problems for the tenant.
  • You should tell the council as soon as possible if you are being harassed and give details of the problems, including the dates and times that it happened. Sometimes the council may not be able to immediately intervene and may need to investigate and gather evidence so it may ask you to fill in diary sheets to record details of the problem.
  • If you believe that the council unreasonably refused to investigate your landlord’s behaviour or if you think it did something wrong in the way it investigated your complaints then you can complain to us and we can investigate.

How do I complain?

  • Unless the situation is urgent you should normally complain to the council first.
  • Then, if you are unhappy with the outcome, or the council is taking too long to look into the matter – we think 12 weeks is reasonable – you can complain to us.
  • If the situation is urgent, or you are at risk or particularly vulnerable, we may be able to look into your complaint even if you have not been through the council’s complaints procedure. You should tell us about this when you contact us.
  • You should normally make your complaint to us within 12 months of realising that the council has done something wrong.
  • To complain to the Ombudsman phone our Advice Team on 0300 061 0614 or 0845 602 1983 (8.30am to 5.00pm, Mondays to Fridays). You will be able to discuss your complaint with one of our advisers. You can text us on 0762 480 4299.
  • You can complete an online complaint form.

If you can consider my complaint what will the Ombudsman look for?

We will consider whether the council has done something wrong in the way it dealt with you and whether this has caused you problems. Some faults we might find are that the council:

  • did not investigate the situation properly to establish whether there was harassment, or decided there was a problem but failed to take action about it;
  • took too long to investigate the situation or failed to take enforcement action when informal attempts to sort out the problem failed;
  • did not take into account, or failed to give proper reasons for not following, the relevant law, policy or guidance;
  • did not explain the outcome of its investigation to you; or
  • made a decision based on inaccurate, incomplete or irrelevant evidence or failed to consider all the evidence that was available.

What happens if the Ombudsman finds the council was at fault?

  • This will depend on the fault and what the consequences are for you. We cannot force the council to take legal action against your landlord but we may ask the council to take urgent steps to investigate the situation and address the problem.
  • If the council agrees that there is a problem but has failed to take action, we may recommend that the council review the evidence and consider taking legal action against your landlord.
  • If the council did not properly investigate the situation or has failed to consider all the evidence that it should have, we may suggest that the council interviews witnesses or uses its own officers as independent witnesses to evaluate the problem and to use as possible evidence in court.
  • In exceptional cases, where it is not possible to reduce the harm you have suffered, or if the harassment has now stopped but we find that you suffered from it for longer than necessary, we may ask the council to pay you compensation. We may also ask for compensation for your time, trouble or expense in pursuing your complaint.
  • Where we find fault with the council’s procedures we may also recommend that the council introduces changes so the same problem will not occur in the future.

Examples of some complaints we have considered

Mr J and Ms K were harassed by their landlord. He sent text messages demanding rent and threatening to take possession proceedings, and visited Ms K at her workplace. They also said he entered the flat to threaten and assault Mr J and stole money and personal possessions. The council did not start to investigate the complaint until three months after it was notified of the situation. When the investigation started the council said an officer would contact the landlord, but this did not happen for another four months and by this time the landlord had changed the locks on the flat and illegally evicted the couple. The council eventually prosecuted the landlord but we found that there were mistakes in the way the council dealt with the problem and that officers had not been properly trained about how to deal with this sort of situation. We did not think the council could have prevented much of what the landlord had done but we recommended the council pay £750 to the couple for the stress they had suffered and the time and trouble they had spent pursuing the complaint. We also asked the council to draw up service standards so in the future people will know what to expect from the council’s tenancy relationship service.

Other sources of information

  • You have the right to take legal action against your landlord as well as complaining to the council but we suggest you contact the Citizens Advice Bureau or a Law Centre or solicitor for advice about this.
  • Advice from the CAB is free and your nearest CAB will be listed in the telephone directory or can be found online at: www.adviceguide.org.uk.

Our fact sheets give some general information about the most common type of complaints we receive but they cannot cover every situation. If you are not sure whether we can look into your complaint, please phone 0300 061 0614.

The Local Government Ombudsmen provide a free, independent and impartial service. We consider complaints about the administrative actions of councils and some other authorities. We cannot question what a council has done simply because someone does not agree with it. If we find something has gone wrong, such as poor service, service failure, delay or bad advice and that a person has suffered as a result the Ombudsmen aim to get it put right by recommending a suitable remedy.

Date Updated: 07/09/11