Summary: Miss X complains the Council unreasonably refused to remedy the time she and her family were in bed and breakfast accommodation and made offers of unsuitable accommodation. The Ombudsman finds fault with the Council for its handling of Miss X’s homelessness case, and for its failure to properly consider her complaint under the complaints process. The Council has agreed to pay Miss X financial remedies and carry out service improvements.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains the Council has unreasonably refused to remedy the time that she and her family were in bed and breakfast accommodation. Miss X says the Council placed them there for 32 weeks but will only remedy 23 weeks.
2. Miss X says the offer of accommodation was unsuitable due to her children’s needs, but the Council has failed to recognise this.
3. Miss X also complains the Council has failed to consider her complaint under the complaints procedure, and unreasonable delayed her complaint.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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)
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(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered Miss X’s complaint to the Council and information she provided. I also considered information from the Council.
7. I invited Miss X and the Council to comment on my draft decision and considered any comments received.

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What I found

Homelessness law

8. 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.
9. Someone is homeless if they have no accommodation or if they have accommodation, but it is not reasonable for them to continue to live there. (Housing Act 1996, Section 175)

The prevention duty

10. If councils are satisfied applicants are threatened with homelessness and eligible for assistance, they must help the applicants to secure that accommodation, so that it does not stop being available for their occupation. In deciding what steps they are to take, councils must have regard to their assessments of the applicants’ cases. (Housing Act 1996, section 195)

The relief duty

11. Councils must take reasonable steps to help to secure suitable accommodation for any eligible homeless person. When a council decides this duty has come to an end, it must notify the applicant in writing (Housing Act 1996, section 189B)

Duty to arrange interim accommodation (section 188)

12. A council must secure interim accommodation for an applicant and their household if it has reason to believe the applicant may be homeless, eligible for assistance and have a priority need, whilst it assesses their application. (Housing Act 1996, section 188)

The main housing duty

13. If a council is satisfied an applicant is homeless, eligible for assistance, and has a priority need the council has a duty to secure that accommodation is available for their occupation.

What happened

14. Miss X approached the Council in March 2022 when her landlord gave an eviction notice. The Council accepted the prevention duty due to Miss X’s eviction.
15. In September, Miss X was made evicted from the property. The Council placed her and her children into emergency interim accommodation in a bed and breakfast.
16. In December 2022 the Council accepted the main housing duty and offered Miss X alternative temporary accommodation. It is not clear what the result of this offer is.
17. Miss X asked for a review of suitability of the bed and breakfast accommodation. In February 2023 the Council upheld the bed and breakfast accommodation was unsuitable for Miss X and her children.
18. In February 2023, the Council says it offered Miss X alternative temporary accommodation. I shall refer to this as Property A. The Council said Miss X did not want to accept the offer as she had a child with additional needs and would not be able to wait for the transport service and take her other child to school at the same time.
19. The Council’s records say it withdrew the offer due to Miss X’s rejection.
20. In April 2023, the Council offered Miss X further alternative temporary accommodation. I shall refer to this as Property B. The Council encouraged Miss X to accept this offer of temporary accommodation. It said that if she declined, it was possible the Council would end its housing duty as it had fulfilled its duty of finding her suitable and accessible housing.
21. In June 2023, the Council withdrew the offer of temporary accommodation as the landlord said the property was no longer available.
22. In June 2023 the Council offered a further option of temporary accommodation into a two-bedroom self-contained unit. Miss X accepted this offer.

Complaint handling

23. Miss X complained to the Council. In her complaint she said:

• Her and her children had been placed in unsuitable bed and breakfast accommodation.
• She had incurred costs related to the bed and breakfast accommodation.
• The Council had made an offer of unsuitable housing (Property A).

24. The Council upheld that Miss X and her children had been in bed and breakfast accommodation longer than they should have been. The Council offered to pay Miss X £150 per week until they made her to the offer of Property A. It invited Miss X to provide her bank statements so it could consider refunding any costs she incurred.
25. Miss X asked the Council to consider her complaint at stage two, as she did not consider Property A to be suitable. She said the Council should remedy for the further time she remained in the bed and breakfast after the offer was made.
26. The Council did not consider Miss X’s complaint at stage two and failed to provide a response or reasoning for this. Therefore, Miss X bought her complaint to the Ombudsman.

Analysis

Was there fault by the Council causing injustice?

27. The Council’s complaint response has already accepted that Miss X and her children were in bed and breakfast accommodation for longer than they should have been. Legislation says this should never be for longer than six weeks for families.
28. The Council proposed to remedy this by paying Miss X £150 a week for 23 weeks. This is calculated to be the time until the Council made Miss X the offer of temporary accommodation in February 2023. The Council refused to remedy any further as it said the offer of Property A made in February 2023 was an offer of suitable accommodation.

Property A

29. In response to my enquiries, the Council provided me with three decision letters. These were:

• An upheld review request for the bed and breakfast accommodation.
• An offer of temporary accommodation in December 2022.
• An offer of temporary accommodation in April 2023.

30. The Council has not provided me with an offer letter for Property A that would have set out why it believed the offer suitable and the consequences of rejecting the offer.
31. The Council has said the reasons for Miss X rejecting the offer due to transport issues did not mean the property was unsuitable, and that it had offered to support with a taxi.
32. If the Council believed Property A to be a suitable offer of accommodation under the legislation, and Miss X rejected it, the Council should have discharged its duty and given Miss X her appeal rights to this decision. The fact the Council kept the case open, didn’t discharge its duty and continued to make offers of properties to Miss X shows that it accepted that Property A was not suitable, and it needed to find an alternative.

Property B

33. The Council made Miss X a further offer in April 2023 of Property B. In the offer letter, the Council said the property was suitable a suitable offer and that Miss X should accept it, as the Council would discharge its duty if she didn’t.
34. While the offer may have been suitable in the Council’s view, I am not convinced the property was available for Miss X to occupy. The Council’s notes show that the property was not immediately available as it was undergoing repairs, and then the landlord removed the property from the market, causing the Council to withdraw the offer.
35. The Council had a duty to secure accommodation that is available for occupation. From what I have seen so far, the Council has not been able to convince me that the accommodation was available for Miss X to occupy.
36. The Council made Miss X a further offer of temporary accommodation in June 2023 which she moved into. The Council should remedy Miss X for the time in the bed and breakfast until this point as it has not been able to show that it secured available accommodation up until this point.
37. The offer of £150 per week is in line with the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies for loss of suitable accommodation. I will therefore continue to use this figure to calculate the remedy recommended to Miss X.

Complaint handling

38. The Council did not respond to Miss X at stage two, despite her requesting this. I asked the Council why it did not do this, it said that it considered the issue resolved at stage one as it had offered compensation.
39. It is clear from the complaint handling that Miss X remained unhappy with the outcome of her complaint at stage one. She felt the Council had not recognised the impact and duration of the issues.
40. If the Council was not going to consider Miss X’s complaint at stage two, it should have written to her and explained its reasoning. I cannot see the Council had reason to reject the request for a stage two, and therefore it should have provided Miss X with a stage two response. Failure to do so was fault by the Council causing Miss X further distress.
41. Part of Miss X’s complaint was for additional costs associated with being in a bed and breakfast. The Council invited Miss X to submit her bank statements for it to consider refunding these costs, which she did, however the Council failed to consider her request or provide an outcome. This was further fault by the Council.

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Agreed action

42. Within four weeks the Council has agreed to

• Write to Miss X apologising for the fault found in the handling of her housing case, and for its handling of her complaint.
• Pay Miss X £150 per week calculated from 6 weeks after Miss X was placed in bed and breakfast accommodation, until the date the temporary accommodation offered in June 2023 was available to occupy.
• Pay Miss X £200 for the distress caused by the Council’s poor handling of her case and failure to properly consider her complaint.
• Consider Miss X’s request for repayment of costs accumulated due to time in the bed and breakfast accommodation.
• Review how it will ensure complaints are properly considered under the complaints process, and where the Council refuses to consider complaints, that it communicates clear reasoning about this to complainants.

43. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Final decision

44. I have completed my investigation. I find fault with the Council for the handling of Miss X’s housing case, and for its handling of her complaint.

Investigator’s final decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman