Summary: the Council took too long to make a decision on Ms X’s 2018 Housing Register application and it did not properly consider whether she may be exempt from a residency requirement. It delayed making a referral to hostel providers and there were faults in the way it responded to her request for homelessness assistance and interim accommodation in October 2018. The Council has agreed to provide a suitable remedy for the injustice caused by these faults.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains about the way the Council assessed and responded to her housing needs.
2. She raised several matters in her complaint, some of which concern the Council’s actions since 2016 in connection with:
1. decisions on various applications to join the Housing Register;
2. the conduct of a case officer in the Homelessness Prevention team;
3. unsuitable offers of accommodation made through the Camden hostel pathway and the Private Rented scheme;
4. the failure to carry out a medical assessment to establish her housing needs.

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What I have investigated

3. I investigated two parts of the complaint:
• the Council’s decision to refuse an application she made in January 2018 to join the Housing Register; and
• that Ms X has received unsuitable offers of accommodation since March 2018 through the hostel pathway and Private Rented scheme.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
5. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons to do so. A complaint is late 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)
6. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

7. I spoke to Ms X and considered all the evidence she provided.
8. I considered the Council’s response to my enquiries and relevant documents from the housing records. I considered relevant sections in the Council’s housing allocations scheme.
9. I have written to Ms X and the Council with my draft decision and considered their comments.

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What I found

The background to this complaint

10. For several years, Ms X has been affected by chronic medical conditions which have a substantial impact on her physical and mental health. One is a fluctuating condition which causes severe fatigue, limits her ability to manage daily activities and restricts her mobility.
11. Until late October 2017, Ms X was the tenant of a privately rented flat in the Council’s area. She could not afford to pay the full rent after her flatmate left. With the Council’s agreement, Ms X left the flat after her landlord served a Section 21 Notice but before the Court made a Possession Order.
12. After she left the flat, Ms X was homeless. She went to stay temporarily with her parents who live in rented accommodation a considerable distance from London. She sometimes stayed temporarily with friends and other relatives.

The January 2018 Housing Register application

13. Ms X complains that the Council’s decision to reject this application because she did not meet the residency criteria was flawed.
14. She says she had provided enough evidence to prove she had lived in the borough for five of the past seven years. She says the Council Tax records would also have confirmed that she met the residency requirement.

The relevant law

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))
16. The law allows councils to decide which categories of people qualify to join its Housing Register. An allocations scheme may exclude people who have a history of rent arrears, anti-social behaviour or who do not meet specified residency requirements. The qualification rules must be set out in the published scheme.

Camden Council’s housing allocations policy

17. The housing allocations policy sets out categories of people who do not qualify to join the Housing Register.
18. One such category is people who have not lived in the borough of Camden for five of the past seven years. The policy goes on to list certain categories of people who are exempt from this residency requirement. One is:

“You are homeless, or threatened with homelessness within 28 days, would normally be owed the main homelessness duty by Camden Council and are working with us to resolve the situation”.

Ms X’s Housing Register application

19. Ms X applied to join the Housing Register in late January 2018. On the form she said she was homeless and staying with family members but needed to move soon. She did not give the address where she was staying. She gave her contact address as the flat in Camden which she left in late October 2017. Ms X told me she had arranged for her mail to be redirected from that address until late July 2018.
20. The form asks applicants to give details of their previous addresses. Ms X gave details of four properties in the borough where she lived between December 2007 and October 2017. For the period 30 April 2012 to 1 September 2013, she said she had “no permanent address”.
21. In late January 2018 Ms X’s case officer in Housing Needs asked for evidence to verify her addresses in 2013 and 2014. Ms X sent the case officer a bank statement sent to the address where she lived between September 2013 and September 2015.
22. In late March 2018 the case officer made an entry in the case notes with a breakdown of Ms X’s points under the scheme. It says she was eligible for 175 points, including 75 hardship points. But the case officer did not complete her assessment and make a decision then.
23. No further action was taken to assess the application until mid-June 2018. The case officer called Ms X on 14 June to discuss it and ask for her current address. The case officer noted that the application showed Ms X had no fixed abode since October 2017. According to the case officer’s notes, Ms X was reluctant to give details of her parents’ address. She said she could not stay with them for much longer.
24. During this call, the case officer informed Ms X she would not be eligible for the 75 hardship points unless she could provide evidence to show she could only receive treatment for her medical condition at a specific hospital in Camden. She emailed Ms X to say she had “partially verified” her application and she could start bidding for properties. Ms X asked for details to enable her to log on to the website.
25. On 15 June the case officer emailed Ms X to say there was a gap in her address history between April and November 2012. She asked Ms X for more information. Ms X said she had stayed a few weeks at a time with different friends and family members during that period but could not provide any further details.
26. The case officer made a decision on 15 June 2018. She sent the letter to Ms X’s former flat in Camden which was the contact address on the January 2018 application form. Ms X says she had asked the Council to send letters by email. She also says the officer should have used common sense because she knew Ms X was no longer at the Camden address and was staying with her parents. The Council says letters are automatically generated with the address field registered for the application. The letter therefore went to the applicant’s contact address. It says it has no record that Ms X asked the Council to amend her contact address for the purpose of processing her Housing Register application.
27. The letter says the application was refused because:

“You have not been a resident in Camden for 5 out of the last 7 years and you do not meet one of the exemptions to this rule.”

28. The letter explained the right to request a review of the decision within 21 days. The letter was sent while Ms X’s mail was still being redirected by Royal Mail. But Ms X says she did not receive it so she was unaware of the decision and did not request a review.
29. In late October 2018 Ms X contacted the case officer again to ask for information to log on to the choice-based lettings website so she could bid for social housing. She also said she had to leave her parents’ home by 12 November.
30. The case officer referred to the decision made on 15 June. She said:

“there is a gap in your address history between 14 April 2012 to 30 November 2012”

The case officer said this “broke the residency chain” and prevented Ms X from achieving the minimum five-year residency requirement.

31. In response to a draft of this decision, the Council sent a copy of a Housing Register application form Ms X had completed in June 2015. It lists Ms X’s addresses between 2007 and 2015. Ms X gave two addresses outside London for the period April 2012 to September 2013.
32. In response to our enquiries, the Council accepted that Ms X still met the residency requirement when she made the application in January 2018. But it is a continuing requirement. So, by the time the case officer made the decision in June 2018, Ms X had no longer been resident in the borough for five of the past seven years. For this reason, she did not qualify to join the Register.
33. The June 2018 letter says Ms X did not meet any of the exemptions to the residency rule. It is not clear from the records whether the case officer had specifically considered whether the homelessness exemption might apply.
34. If Ms X had qualified to join the Register in January 2018 she would have been entitled to 150 points until 25 February 2018. She would then have had 100 points because the 50 points awarded for homelessness would have been removed after four months.
35. The Council’s allocations records show it did not allocate any one bedroom first floor properties to applicants with 150 points or less between January 2018 and 25 February 2018. And it did not allocate any one bedroom first floor properties to applicants with 100 points or less between 25 February 2018 and April 2018. Some first floor one bedroom properties were let to applicants with 100 points or less after April 2018. So, the Council says Ms X did not miss potential offers because she was not accepted on the Register between January and April 2018. Properties only went to applicants with 100 points or less after the date Ms X ceased to meet the residency requirement.

Analysis

36. The Council accepts it took too long to make a decision on Ms X’s Housing Register application. That was fault.
37. I considered whether this delay affected the decision that Ms X did not meet the residency qualification.
38. When the decision was made on 15 June 2018, Ms X had not been residing in Camden for five of the past seven years. She left Camden in late October 2017 and had been living out of the borough for just over seven months by June 2018. On the 2015 application form, Ms X gave two addresses out of London where she said she lived for 17 months between April 2012 and September 2013. So, on 15 June 2018, she had not been residing in Camden for 24 months in the past seven years. The decision that she did not meet the residency requirement on 15 June 2018 was therefore correct on the facts.
39. Would the outcome have been different if the Council had made a decision sooner? When Ms X made the application in January 2018, she still met the residency requirement. At that point she had only resided out of Camden for a total period of 20 months in the past seven years. So, if the application had been assessed promptly, she would have qualified to join the Housing Register and remain on it for a few months. However, the residency condition is a continuing requirement. So, Ms X would not have qualified to stay on the Register after May 2018. By then she would have been living out of Camden for 24 months in the past seven years.
40. The Council’s allocation records show Ms X would not have made a successful bid for social housing if she had been on the Register for that brief period between January and May 2018.
41. I also considered whether Ms X met the conditions for an exemption to the five year residency requirement for homeless people who would normally be owed the main housing duty.
42. The Council is not persuaded that this exemption would have applied. It says Ms X stayed with her parents from October 2017 until September 2019. So it is not clear that she was still homeless in June 2018. This exemption was intended to apply to applicants who were working with the Council on a homelessness prevention pathway.
43. I cannot say whether the Council would have accepted the main housing duty if it had considered whether Ms X qualified for this exemption in June 2018. Ms X will never know whether the Council would have applied this exemption and accepted her on the Register if it had properly considered her circumstances in June 2018.
44. I found the following faults by the Council:
• delay in making a decision on the January 2018 Housing Register application;
• it is not clear from the records whether the Council had properly considered whether Ms X may have qualified for the “homeless” exemption from the residency requirement before it made the decision in June 2018.

These faults caused Ms X uncertainty and frustration.

45. After further consideration, I do not consider it was fault for the Council to send the June 2018 decision letter to Ms X’s contact address in Camden. She had left that address in October 2017. But she gave it as her contact address when she made the Housing Register application form in January 2018. She had also arranged for mail sent to that address to be redirected until July 2018. She did not ask the Council to amend its records or send letters to her parents’ address instead. I do not know why Ms X did not receive the letter. But it was not fault for the Council to send it to the Camden contact address.

Unsuitable offers of accommodation made through the hostel pathway and Private Rented scheme

46. Ms X says she received unsuitable offers of accommodation because the Council did not inform housing providers about her mobility needs. She considers it should have completed a medical assessment before making the referral.
47. The Camden hostel pathway is a group of hostels which caters for single homeless people with support needs. It aims to support homeless people to move from homelessness to independent living. The Council refers single homeless people to independent housing providers who can offer accommodation to single homeless people. The independent providers work in partnership with the Council. To be eligible for assistance, the person must be homeless, have support needs and a local connection with Camden.
48. Ms X approached the Council for housing advice and assistance after she left her privately rented flat in late October 2017. A case officer in the Homelessness Prevention team completed a Camden Hostels Pathway referral form early in January 2018. The Council accepts there was a delay in making the referral but, due to the passage of time, it cannot explain the reasons.
49. The referral form includes a comprehensive summary of Ms X’s physical and mental health conditions. It refers to medical evidence from a hospital specialist and her GP. It explains the impact Ms X’s medical conditions have on her ability to manage daily living activities. It says Ms X cannot work for medical reasons and gives details of her disability benefits. It says her mobility is compromised and she needs to be assessed to decide if she could manage one flight of stairs.
50. In mid-January 2018 one provider responded to the referral. It said it could not help because the accommodation it provides for women has more than one flight of stairs. It also had concerns Ms X may not be safe in the event of an emergency evacuation.
51. The case officer asked the housing provider to reconsider and provided further information about Ms X’s needs. In February 2018 the project manager confirmed the decision not to offer Ms X accommodation. There was no accommodation available on the ground floor, and there were stairs to access the kitchens and reach the building exits.
52. In March 2018 the case officer referred Ms X to another hostel provider. Before doing so, she asked Ms X if she could manage to get down 40 steps if the lift was out of order. On 20 March the provider said a room was available on the third floor with lift access.
53. The case officer contacted Ms X to ask if she could view the room the following day. But Ms X explained she could not attend a viewing at such short notice and asked if she could view the room the following week.
54. In the event, the provider was not comfortable about putting someone with Ms X’s mobility needs in a third floor room. According to the case notes, Ms X also said she did not want to be on the third floor due to her poor mobility. She said she was struggling to cope with 12 steps in her parents’ home. The case officer asked the provider to let her know if a ground or first floor room became available.
55. In late March 2018 the case officer contacted Ms X to ask if she would be interested in a first floor room with the same provider. Ms X contacted the case officer the next day to say she no longer considered the hostel pathway was appropriate for her. She did not want to take the room offered by the provider and would make a homelessness application instead.
56. On the same day, the case officer discussed the options with Ms X’s legal adviser and sent an email to Ms X. She said Ms X would be offered hostel accommodation whether she applied for homelessness assistance or used the hostel pathway scheme. But she would get more choice over the accommodation on the hostel pathway route.
57. On 28 March Ms X’s legal adviser informed the case officer that Ms X was not rejecting the pathways accommodation offer but wanted more information.
58. On 20 April Ms X’s legal adviser contacted the case officer to confirm that Ms X “is happy to be offered pathway accommodation providing [it] is suitable for her needs”.
59. Nothing happened between late April and mid-June. The case officer then made a note saying Ms X had spoken to her legal adviser and agreed the hostel pathway was the best option. The case officer spoke to Ms X. She confirmed she would consider any hostel that could offer accommodation suitable for her needs.
60. In late August Ms X was considered for accommodation with a different provider. But the property was not considered suitable due to the number of stairs.
61. In October Ms X sent an email to the case officer about her Housing Register application. She said she would become homeless on 12 November. The case officer did not act on the information that Ms X was threatened with homelessness.
62. In October 2018 Ms X’s legal adviser asked the case officer to take a homelessness application and arrange interim accommodation for Ms X. The case officer replied to the first email. She said Ms X was on the waiting list for the hostel pathway scheme. She said she would now refer her to the Private Rented scheme. She did not respond to the request to take a homelessness application, or to two further emails from the legal adviser repeating the request.
63. Ms X says her father needed a separate bedroom to convalesce after an operation. So she could not remain in her parents’ home after 12 November and needed interim accommodation. She says she arranged to stay for just over two weeks in a B&B hotel at her own expense because the Council did not reply to her request. She then returned to her parents’ home.
64. In mid-October the case officer referred Ms X to its Private Rented scheme. Ms X says she had always made it clear she was not interested in private rented accommodation.
65. The cases notes say an officer tried to contact Ms X on 29 October to offer her a viewing of a studio flat. He could not contact her directly but left a message with her mother. Ms X later spoke to the officer. He decided the studio was not suitable for Ms X because of the stairs.
66. In late November 2018 Ms X’s legal adviser sent a letter before action to the Council’s Legal Service. She said the Council had failed:
• to take a homelessness application;
• to carry out a housing assessment and provide a Personalised Housing Plan (PHP);
• to provide interim accommodation while it made homelessness inquiries.
67. On 30 November an officer in the Legal Service sent Ms X’s legal adviser an email confirming that the Council would accept a duty. It did not say which specific duty but said a full response would follow. Ms X says her legal adviser did not get any further response to her letter before action.
68. On the same day a Homelessness Prevention manager tried to contact Ms X but she was not available. He spoke to Ms X’s father who confirmed she had moved out because he needed to put medical equipment in the bedroom she had been using.
69. On 6 December the manager sent Ms X an email saying he had been trying to contact her for the past few days on her parents’ landline. He explained the Council had found suitable ground floor interim accommodation in Camden but it could not hold the offer open for much longer. He asked her to respond by lunchtime.
70. On 7 December Ms X emailed the manager to say she had tried to call him that morning but could not reach him. The manager replied to give her a contact number for the team. He suggested she speak to him or the duty manager about the temporary accommodation offer.
71. According to the Council’s records, an officer in the Private Rented service tried to contact Ms X on 13 December 2018 to invite her to view a property in East London. Ms X said she could not view the property on the same day. Ms X says she does not remember this contact.
72. On 18 December another officer sent Ms X an email because she could not contact her by phone to discuss another private rented property. Ms X spoke to the officer to explain she was not in London and could not attend property viewings at short notice.
73. On 11 January Ms X contacted the manager in the Homelessness Prevention service to confirm she had stayed with her family over the Christmas period. She said she would stay with her parents while she had hospital treatment near their home.
74. On 14 February Ms X sent an email to the manager to say she had completed her hospital treatment. She did not say whether she needed the Council to make an immediate offer of interim accommodation.
75. On 22 March Ms X’s legal adviser contacted the manager to ask what steps the Council was taking to secure temporary accommodation. She said Ms X was sofa-surfing. In late March 2019 the manager tried to call Ms X to get an update on her circumstances but could not reach her. Ms X returned his call and her legal adviser also sent him an email saying Ms X’s parents had asked her to leave. The manager told the legal adviser he had since spoken to Ms X and the Council would arrange temporary accommodation for her. He said Ms X agreed to contact him again after she considered the options and discussed the situation with her parents.
76. On 1 April Ms X informed the manager she would like to move to temporary accommodation. She did not say when she would need it.
77. On 3 April the case officer called Ms X on her parents’ landline. Ms X’s mother told her Ms X was unwell and could not speak to her. The case officer asked whether Ms X would prefer temporary accommodation in Camden or in the area where her parents lived.
78. On the same day, Ms X’s legal adviser contacted the manager to say Ms X would be willing to accept temporary accommodation in Camden. This email is not in the Council’s case records. The case officer made further attempts to contact Ms X on the landline and by email in April without success.
79. On 30 April the manager spoke to Ms X. According to his notes, Ms X told him she could stay with her parents and had no immediate need for temporary accommodation. She also said she would prefer the hostel pathway to private rented accommodation. She said she could manage stairs up to the first floor.
80. In mid-May the manager tried to contact Ms X about a potential offer of a studio flat. He could not reach Ms X on her mobile or her parents’ landline. According to the case notes, he called a few days later and spoke to Ms X’s father who agreed to pass on a message. Ms X says she did not get a message and has expressed doubt about whether the manager spoke to her father.
81. There were no further developments until early August when the case officer called Ms X to discuss the offer of a one bedroom flat. Ms X agreed to view the flat but mentioned she had a pet dog. The case officer said she would contact the letting agent to ask if the landlord would let her keep a dog. It is not clear from the records what then happened.
82. Later in August, a Council officer spoke to Ms X’s legal adviser. According to the case notes, Ms X’s legal adviser suggested a hostel would be more appropriate for Ms X’s needs than self-contained accommodation.
83. In mid-September 2019 Ms X was offered a room in a hostel in Camden. She accepted the room and returned to Camden. The Council then ended the relief duty.
84. In response to my enquiries the Council said it had accepted the duty to arrange interim accommodation for Ms X in October 2018. But it did not complete a housing assessment or a PHP. It did not notify Ms X or her legal adviser that it had accepted the relief duty. It has apologised for these oversights.

Analysis

85. There was no good reason for the Council’s delay between October 2017 and January 2018 in making the referral to the hostel pathways scheme. Ms X was already homeless and staying temporarily with her parents. The delay means Ms X could not be considered for offers of accommodation until 2018.
86. The case officer included detailed information about Ms X’s medical conditions, and the impact on her daily life and mobility, in the hostel pathway referral form. In particular, she flagged up Ms X’s mobility needs and said the provider would need to assess these. I do not consider the Council failed to give the hostel providers adequate information about Ms X’s medical needs.
87. The Council did not need to commission a medical assessment before making a referral under the hostel pathway scheme. This scheme is separate from the Housing Register or homelessness assessments which may involve a medical assessment of the applicant’s housing needs.
88. It is important to note that the offers of hostel accommodation were made by the housing providers and not the Council. Some offers proved to be unsuitable because the room was on a high floor level or there were too many internal or external stairs. But the hostel providers could only offer rooms that became available, and Ms X was free to refuse any offers which were not suitable due to her mobility needs. She was not penalised for refusing these offers.
89. It is clear from the case records that it officers sometimes had difficulty in making contact with Ms X. They needed a swift response when they were making offers of accommodation. When Ms X was unwell, she could not reply immediately to emails or take telephone calls. She could not easily attend property viewings in London because she was staying some distance away. She could not travel at short notice due to her disability and needed to make special travel arrangements. Officers could contact Ms X’s legal adviser but sometimes they needed to speak directly to Ms X about accommodation offers. These factors made it more difficult to meet her housing needs. Due to her disability and the distance between her parents’ home and London, Ms X could not always take up these offers. The circumstances were difficult but this was not due to fault by the Council.
90. Ms X originally opted to be on the hostel pathway. But the Council did not respond to repeated requests from Ms X and her legal adviser in October 2018 to take a homelessness application. It only took action when the legal adviser sent a letter before action to the Legal Service. Even then it did not comply with the legal duty to carry out a new housing assessment or produce a Personalised Housing Plan. It did not notify Ms X which duty it had accepted. That was fault.
91. Ms X says she did not know which duties the Council had accepted and what practical steps it would take to try to relieve her homelessness. The delay also meant Ms X arranged and paid for bed and breakfast accommodation in November 2018 because the Council did not respond promptly when she and her legal adviser asked it to arrange interim accommodation.

Agreed action

92. Within one month, the Council will:
• apologise in writing to Ms X for the way it handled the January 2018 Housing Register application and the October 2018 homelessness application;
• complete the assessment of her new Housing Register application to decide whether Ms X qualifies to join the Housing Register and notify her in writing of its decision and the review rights;
• pay £200 to recognise the distress caused by its poor handling of the October 2018 homelessness application: its failure to complete a new housing assessment, issue a Personalised Housing Plan and notify her of the duty it had accepted;
• reimburse Ms X’s reasonable costs if she can provide satisfactory evidence to confirm what she spent on bed and breakfast accommodation for 2½ weeks in November 2018 when she could not stay with her parents;
• assess Ms X’s current housing needs and prepare a move-on plan from the hostel.

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Final decision

93. I have completed the investigation and found Ms X suffered injustice due to fault by the Council. The Council has agreed to provide a satisfactory remedy.

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

94. I did not investigate:
• the Council’s refusal to let Ms X join the Housing Register in February 2017;
• her complaint about the case officer’s conduct between July and October 2017;
• the failure to keep to an agreement to provide suitable accommodation by December 2017;
95. These events happened more than 12 months before Ms X complained to the Ombudsman. As these parts of the complaint are late, I decided we should not investigate them.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman