Summary: The Council was at fault in its handling of Miss X’s homelessness case. It delayed in rectifying disrepair in her temporary accommodation (TA), prevented her from appealing the suitability of that TA and, when she faced eviction, delayed in providing her with alternative TA. The Council should agree remedies to remedy the distress and uncertainty caused to Miss X by its actions.

The complaint

1. Miss X, who is homeless, complained the Council:
1. Delayed in dealing with her complaints of disrepair in her temporary accommodation (TA)
2. Did not properly consider whether the accommodation remained suitable in the face of ongoing disrepair
3. Did not properly consider her request for re-banding on the Council’s housing register
4. Delayed in rehousing her when she was facing eviction from her TA, and
5. Did not properly explain how she had accumulated housing benefit arrears.
2. Miss X said this caused her and her family distress and uncertainty. She wanted the Council to apologise, provide an explanation and house her and her family in suitable accommodation.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
5. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(1), as amended)

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What I have and have not investigated

6. Some of Miss X’s complaints dated back many years. As set out at paragraph 4, we cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. I have seen not good reason why Miss X could not have complained to us sooner, and so I have not investigated any events before May 2024, when her landlord served her with an eviction notice from her TA.

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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered evidence provided by Miss X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance. I discussed the complaint with Miss X on the telephone.
8. Miss X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Law, policy and guidance

Homelessness

Legislation and statutory guidance

9. Part 7 of the Housing Act 1996 and the Homelessness Code of Guidance for Local Authorities set out councils’ powers and duties to people who are homeless or threatened with homelessness.

The main housing duty

10. If a council is satisfied an applicant is homeless, eligible for assistance, and has a priority need the council has a duty to make accommodation available (unless it refers the application to another housing authority under section 198).)

Suitability of accommodation

11. The law says councils must ensure all accommodation provided to homeless applicants is suitable for the needs of the applicant and members of their household. This duty applies to interim accommodation and accommodation provided under the main housing duty. (Housing Act 1996, section 206 and Homelessness Code of Guidance 17.2)
12. Homelessness TA must be legally suitable. (Housing Act 1996, section 206) Anyone who believes their TA is unsuitable can ask the Council to review the accommodation’s suitability. (Housing Act 1996, section 202) If the Council’s review decides the accommodation is unsuitable, the Council must provide suitable accommodation. If the review decides the accommodation is suitable, the applicant has the right to appeal to the county court on a point of law. (Housing Act 1996, section 204)
13. Councils have a duty to keep the suitability of accommodation under review. An applicant may ask a council to reconsider the suitability of their current temporary accommodation if their circumstances change. Councils should also consider whether the extent of disrepair means a property is not suitable. The council should then make a new suitability decision. (R(B) v Redbridge LBC [2019] EWHC 250 (Admin)).

Disrepair in Temporary Accommodation

14. In the first instance, occupiers of TA are expected to report any defects or disrepair to their landlord or managing agent. But if the landlord or agent fails to respond, or does not inspect the property and arrange for works to be done in a reasonable time, the applicant may then contact the council. The council should then liaise with the landlord or managing agent to get necessary repairs done and check works have been satisfactorily completed.

Housing allocations

The published scheme

15. Every local housing authority must publish an allocations scheme that sets out how it prioritises applicants, and its procedures for allocating housing. All allocations must be made in strict accordance with the published scheme. (Housing Act 1996, section 166A(1) & (14))

Reasonable preference

16. An allocations scheme must give reasonable preference to applicants in the following categories:

• Homeless people;
• People in insanitary, overcrowded or unsatisfactory housing;
• People who need to move on medical or welfare grounds;
• People who need to move to avoid hardship to themselves or others;
  (Housing Act 1996, section 166A(3))

Decisions and review rights

17. Housing applicants can ask the council to review a wide range of decisions about their applications, including decisions about their housing priority.

Review procedures

18. Statutory guidance on the allocation of accommodation says:

• Review procedures should be clear and fair with timescales for each stage of the process;
• There should be a timescale for requesting a review - 21 days is suggested as reasonable;
• The review should be carried out by an officer senior to the original decision maker, or by a panel not including the original decision maker;
• Reviews should normally be completed within a set deadline – 8 weeks is suggested as reasonable.

Housing Benefit

Overpayments

19. If a council reviews a claim and decides it has paid too much benefit, this is an overpayment. Some overpayments are always recoverable (although a council has discretion to not recover any overpayment). Councils can recover an overpayment from the claimant or the person to whom it made the overpayment, for example the claimant’s landlord if a council has made a direct payment. The person from whom the authority decides to recover an overpayment can appeal.

Decisions, reviews and appeals

20. Most housing benefit decisions have appeal rights. The claimant can first ask the local authority to 'reconsider' (internally review) its decision. There is then a right of appeal to the independent benefits tribunal (The Social Entitlement Chamber of the First-Tier Tribunal) administered by the Ministry of Justice, through its HM Courts and Tribunal Service. There is a further right of appeal of the First Tier Tribunal’s decision (on a point of law) to the Upper Tribunal.
21. Before asking the local authority to reconsider its decision, the claimant can ask for a written statement of reasons for the decision. A claimant must ask for a reconsideration and/or appeal within one month of the date of the decision. This is extended if the claimant has asked for a statement of reasons.
22. Appealable decisions include all decisions on the amount of benefit and its calculation, treatment of income and capital, overpayments, decisions about who to pay

What happened

23. This section sets out the key events in this case and is not intended to be a detailed chronology. I have not investigated the events set out in paragraph 24 that are included for background only.
24. Miss X is homeless. The Council decided that it owed Miss X the main housing duty in 2018. It housed her in TA in 2019, where she lived with her three children. The Council awarded Miss X priority Band B on its housing register (where Band A is the highest priority band).
25. The managing agent of the property Miss X lived in served her with an eviction notice in May 2024. Miss X requested the Council rehouse her and, at the same time, reconsider her priority on the housing register on medical grounds. She provided evidence to support her re-banding request from the Council’s Children’s Social Work team and from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service.
26. The managing agent carried out an inspection of Miss X’s TA in late June 2024. This found that the front door handle did not work properly, the landing light did not work, the ceiling in the living room needed to be redecorated, and the garden was overgrown.
27. A Council officer met with Miss X to discuss her need for rehousing.
28. The Council responded to Miss X’s housing priority request in early August. The decision letter included consideration of:
• The evidence submitted by Miss X;
• The advice of an independent Medical Advisor; and
• The Council’s own policies
29. The Council’s decision was that Miss X should be in Band C on medical grounds but should remain in priority Band B on the grounds of her homelessness. The letter explained that Miss X could request a review of the decision within 21 days of receiving it.
30. In late August, Miss X requested a review of the banding decision, supported by new evidence from her Community Psychiatric Nurse. Miss X said it was discrimination on the Council’s part to refuse to consider her medical needs as life-threatening because they were mental rather than physical.
31. In early October, Miss X complained to the Council that:
• The Council officer who she had met with to discuss rehousing had cancelled their next appointment and had not responded to further contact, even though she had an eviction hearing date scheduled for late October;
• The Council had not responded to her request for a review of its decision not to change her priority band, and this was affecting her ability to bid on suitable properties; and
• The Council had informed her that it had overpaid her £11000 in Housing Benefit, that it would seek to recover.
32. In late October, the Council officer dealing with Miss X’s rehousing case spoke with her and sent her copy of her rehousing reassessment and personalised housing plan.
33. Miss X re-submitted her concerns in the form of a formal complaint in early November.
34. An officer from the Council’s Revenue and Benefits Team called Miss X in mid-November to discuss the complaint she had raised about the overpayment of Housing Benefit. Miss X said she disputed the decision that had created the overpayment. The Council officer told her this needed to be dealt with as an appeal, not a complaint, and that Miss X should submit an appeal to the Council in writing. Following the call, the Council officer sent the same information as an email, stating “you can ask us for an explanation, or to look at the decision again, or appeal.” She also included a link to the webpage where Miss X could lodge an appeal.
35. Also in mid-November, the Council’s Reviews Team issued its decision regarding its review of the Council’s priority banding decision. The decision was made by a Council officer who was senior to the officer that had made the original decision. The senior officer had not been involved in the original decision. The review decision letter included consideration of:
• The further evidence submitted by Miss X;
• Relevant legislation;
• Independent medical advice; and
• The Council’s own policies
36. The Council’s decision included “I am satisfied that your circumstances do not meet the criteria for an award of a critical medical priority, such as would qualify for Band A on the housing register. I recognise that you have a severe and enduring mental health condition and I appreciate that the uncertainty regarding your next accommodation is distressing. I apologise for this.” The Council’s decision was, again, that Miss X should be in Band C on medical grounds, but should remain in priority Band B on the grounds of her homelessness. The decision also noted that Miss X considered she needed a four-bedroomed home to meet the special needs of one of her children. The Council decided that a three-bedroomed property could meet the family’s needs, because the other two children could share a bedroom and the independent medical advice did not recommend the need for an additional bedroom on medical grounds.
37. Also in mid-November, Miss X raised issues of disrepair in her TA with the Council’s rehousing officer. These included: mould, no electrical certificate, a faulty boiler, and no real front door lock. The rehousing officer contacted the managing agent, which replied in late November that it had last inspected the property in June (it attached a copy of the inspection report) and would arrange another inspection for the following week.
38. In early December, Miss X asked for a reassessment of her housing band based on new medical information.
39. The Council responded to Miss X’s complaint in mid-December, at stage one of its complaints procedure. This response included:
• Consideration of the suitability of Miss X’s TA, including size, location and affordability. It said that, once the issues of disrepair had been dealt with, the property would meet all of Miss X’s requirements. It said the Council’s Temporary Accommodation Service Team would discuss the matters of disrepair with the managing agent and ask them to remedy them.
• The Council apologised for the delay in dealing with Miss X’s rehousing request, and said she would be transferred to new TA “in the near future”.
• A note that the Council had completed the housing banding review process in November
• That the housing benefit aspect of her complaint was being handled separately (by the Revenue and Benefits Team).
40. The Council issued a further decision about Miss X’s priority on the housing register in early January 2025. The decision letter included consideration of:
• The further evidence submitted by Miss X;
• Relevant legislation;
• Independent medical advice; and
• The Council’s own policies
41. The Council’s decision was unchanged from those it had made in August and November 2024.
42. The decision letter explained that Miss X could request a review of the decision within 21 days of receiving it. 16 days after the Council issued this decision, Miss X requested a further review. She also sent her email to the Council’s inbox for stage 2 complaints, as it included information about the matters of disrepair she was living with.
43. In mid-March, Miss X contacted the Council to complain that it had not responded to either her stage 2 complaint or her housing banding review request. She said that the matters of disrepair she had raised in her email had not been addressed.
44. In late May, the Council emailed Miss X, saying: “If you would like to have a reassessment of your medical information then please provide any further medical evidence that you did not provide for the initial assessment. We can only take recent evidence so that our independent medical advisor can conduct a new assessment.”
45. The Council responded to Miss X’s complaint at stage two in mid-July 2025. This response said:
• The Council had not received a request for a review of its 6 January housing banding decision within 21 days, and the complaints function could not “overturn housing decisions or extend statutory deadlines”.
• If Miss X’s circumstances had changed since the January 2025 decision, she was welcome to “submit updated medical evidence for reassessment”.
• The Council understood that Miss X was living with ongoing repair issues, including:
1. A non-functional boiler with a leak;
2. No electrical safety check since moving in, resulting in faults and fire risk;
3. Severe damp and mould in multiple rooms;
4. Structural damage, including falling plaster and a leaking ceiling;
5. Inadequate security due to a faulty front door lock and damaged door; and
6. A back garden filled with rubbish, attracting pests
• It said the managing agent was responsible for these matters and, although the Council had asked them to carry out an urgent inspection in December 2024, no progress had been made.
• The Council had contacted the managing agent which said that it had scheduled remedial work for the following week. The Council “strongly encourage[d]” Miss X to contact the managing agent directly to pursue her complaint.
• The letter concluded by advising Miss X that she could escalate her complaint to the Housing Ombudsman Service.
46. Miss X’s landlord served her with a new eviction notice in July 2025. She was evicted from the property in October 2025. The Council rehoused her and her family in new TA on the day she was evicted.

Council response to enquiries

47. In response to my enquiries about the time taken to rehouse Miss X, the Council told me it apologised for the delay in providing Miss X with alternative TA. It said it had placed her on its transfer list when the managing agent obtained an order for possession but, due to high levels of demand, they could not move Miss X as quickly as they would have wished.
48. The Council told me that, at the end of November 2024, there were 170 other households on the Council’s transfer list, and a further 42 in bed and breakfast accommodation, that required a 3-bedroom property. The Council said it had to prioritise households that were going to become homeless sooner than Miss X, or that it had a statutory duty to accommodate, before Miss X.
49. The Council acknowledged that providing accommodation on the eviction date had created additional stress and difficulty and it apologised to Miss X and her family for the distress caused.

My findings

Disrepair

50. The Council is responsible for disrepair in temporary accommodation it has arranged. We would expect it to investigate reports of disrepair and take action to ensure these are rectified without undue delay. We hold the Council responsible for actions or omissions by organisations, such as managing agents, acting on its behalf.
51. The managing agent did not remedy the issues of disrepair it had noted when it inspected Miss X’s TA in June 2024. And so, when Miss X raised those issues of disrepair with the Council in November 2024, the Council should have taken action to ensure that the managing agent addressed them. I have seen no evidence that the Council took such action at that time, beyond liaising with the managing agent which said it would inspect again in December. This failing was fault.
52. In its stage two response to Miss X’s complaint, in July 2025, the Council acknowledged that the managing agent had not carried out any remedial work. Although it liaised with the managing agent directly, the Council also encouraged Miss X to pursue the matter herself, saying that the managing agent was responsible for it. This response was fault: the legal duty lies with the council to ensure the applicant is in suitable accommodation which is free from disrepair or hazards. 
53. As the issues of disrepair were not dealt with until at least July 2025, the Council’s faults caused Miss X the injustice of living with disrepair for eight months longer than would have been the case if it had acted without fault.

Suitability

54. The stage one response to Miss X’s complaint included consideration of the suitability of Miss X’s temporary accommodation, including size, location and affordability. This response was, effectively, an informal suitability decision. The Council did not advise Miss X of her right to request a section 202 review. This fault caused Miss X injustice in that she was prevented from using the section 202 review procedure to challenge the Council’s decision on suitability and then, if necessary, appeal.

Allocations/re-banding

55. The Council’s allocations scheme says homeless applicants who are in temporary accommodation will be awarded Band B. Miss X said her circumstances, including her medical conditions and her children’s special needs, meant she should be in Band A.
56. The Ombudsman cannot question a decision about housing priority if the Council took all relevant information into account and followed its published allocations scheme. In this case, there is no evidence the Council failed to consider relevant information or departed from its published scheme. It explained the reasons for its decision and there was no undue delay in making them. I therefore find no fault in how the Council considered Miss X’s priority for housing in the decisions it made in August and November 2024 and January 2025. The Council’s decision not to change the properties Miss X was eligible to bid on from three to four bedrooms was also made without fault.
57. In its early January 2025 decision letter, the Council offered to review its decision if Miss X wished. Miss X requested a review within the timescale set by the Council, but the Council said it had not received this request in time and would not consider it. This was fault, that caused Miss X uncertainty as to whether a further review would have changed her priority banding.

Rehousing

58. I have considered Miss X’s complaint that the Council delayed in rehousing her when she was facing eviction from her TA. In response to my enquiries, the Council acknowledged that – given Miss X was rehoused on her eviction date – it did delay. I welcome this acknowledgment and the accompanying apology for the distress caused. The Ombudsman recognises that there is a shortage of TA in many areas, especially in London boroughs, and the Council provided evidence that it delayed because of the number of families ahead of Miss X on the transfer list. However, I have seen no evidence that the Council took proactive steps to source alternative TA for Miss X when she faced eviction, and so I find it acted with fault. The delay in rehousing Miss X caused her distress and uncertainty.

Housing Benefit

59. Miss X complained that the Council did not properly explain how she had accumulated housing benefit arrears. I have seen evidence, in the form of an email sent by an officer from the Council’s Revenue and Benefits Team in November 2024, that the Council did explain its decision. That email also told Miss X that she could ask for an explanation, or ask the Council to revisit the decision, or she could appeal. That Miss X did not go on to take such action was not the Council’s fault.

Complaint handling

60. Miss X first complained to the Council in early October 2024. The Council’s complaints policy sets out that it will respond to complaints at stage one within 10 working days. The Council did not respond until mid-December. That delay was fault, that caused Miss X uncertainty.
61. Miss X asked for her complaint to be escalated to stage two in January 2025. The Council’s complaints policy sets out that it will respond to complaints at stage two within 20 working days. The Council did not respond until mid-July. The lengthy delay of five months was fault, that caused Miss X further uncertainty.
62. The Council’s stage two complaint response concluded that Miss X could escalate her complaint to the Housing Ombudsman Service. This was incorrect and was fault. In response to a recommendation we made in another case, the Council agreed to “issue a reminder to staff that complaints about the condition and suitability of temporary accommodation should be signposted to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, not the Housing Ombudsman”. As this fault has been repeated, I will make a further service improvement recommendation.

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Action

63. Within one month of my final decision, the Council has agreed to:
1. Apologise to Miss X for the injustice caused by the faults I have identified;
2. Offer to review Miss X’s priority banding on the housing register;
3. Make Miss X a payment of £1000 in recognition of the injustice caused by:
• Living with disrepair for longer than necessary;
• Being prevented from using the section 202 review procedure to challenge the Council’s decision on suitability; and
• The delay in identifying alternative TA when she was being evicted
1. Make Miss X a further payment of £200 in recognition of the injustice caused by its faults in the handling of her complaint.
64. Within three months of my final decision, the Council has agreed to:
1. Provide guidance or training for relevant staff based on our Good Practice Guide – Unsuitable Temporary Accommodation; and
2. Develop an action plan showing how staff will be supported to ensure the Council consistently signposts to the correct Ombudsman at the end of its complaints procedure, with reference to our published guidance.
65. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The organisation should consider this guidance in making the apology I have recommended above.
66. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

67. I find fault causing injustice. The Council has agreed actions to remedy injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman