Compliance with the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code
The Housing Ombudsman is a free, independent, and impartial service dedicated to investigating complaints and resolving disputes involving tenants and leaseholders of housing associations and local authorities. In April 2022, they introduced a new Complaint Handling Code. As of April 1, 2024, this code became statutory, meaning landlords must legally adhere to its requirements. All landlords must self-assess and publish their compliance with the code annually.
Our Board considers the publication of both documents as an important step in increasing transparency in how we operate and being accountable to our residents. We have a well-established and engaged Resident Complaints Group, and it is encouraging to see the important role they play in scrutinising performance on complaints.
The Complaint Handling Code aims to establish best practices in complaint management and to enhance services for residents. It seeks to build a positive complaints culture within the social housing sector, ensuring prompt resolution of complaints and using insights from complaints to drive service improvements.
Stephen Stringer, Chair of the Board at Fairhive, expressed his satisfaction with the publication of our Annual Complaints Performance and Service Improvement Report and the Self-Assessment: “On behalf of the Fairhive Board, I’m pleased to be able to publish our Annual Complaints Performance and Service Improvement Report along with our Self-Assessment against the Complaint Handling Code.
The information feeding into the Report builds up over the year and enables teams to understand the trends and root causes identified from complaints and helps them to focus on the areas where we are not delivering to expectations.
We look forward to seeing that the improvements made during the year have a positive impact on our residents and encourage employees to listen to our residents’ feedback on what is important to them.”
Our Annual Complaints Performance and Service Improvement Report and Self-Assessment against the Housing Ombudsman's Complaint Handling Code are now available for reading and download.
You can find more about our Complaints Procedure in the ‘Compliments, Complaints and Compensation’ section of our website.
