What to do when your housing association is not fixing repairs

Create one trail across every team and contractor

Report the condition through the association's official channel and save the repair reference. If a contractor provides a separate job number, record both numbers together rather than treating them as different problems.

For each visit, note the date, access, inspection findings, work completed, materials or follow-up promised, and whether another team owns the next action.

Sources: Housing Ombudsman; Shelter England

Describe the condition that remains, not only the missed appointment

• Name the affected room and defect.
• State whether the condition is spreading, recurring, or preventing normal room use.
• Attach current room-context and close-up photographs where the reporting channel permits.
• List temporary work separately from work that addressed the underlying cause.
• Ask for the next inspection or repair action in writing.

Move unresolved service failures into a formal complaint

A repair chase asks for work to progress. A formal complaint asks the landlord to investigate what went wrong in its service and put that failure right. Make the distinction clear in your message.

Social landlords must operate a two-stage complaint process under the statutory Complaint Handling Code. Use the landlord's published process and retain both stage responses.

1. 1

   Set out the history

   List the first report, key chasers, appointments, attempted repairs, and the present condition.

2. 2

   Identify the service failure

   Explain any missing updates, repeated diagnosis, missed actions, or work that did not resolve the cause.

3. 3

   Ask for a practical remedy

   Request a named next action, written plan, inspection, communication adjustment, or correction to inaccurate records as appropriate.

Sources: Housing Ombudsman; Housing Ombudsman

Know when to check the Housing Ombudsman route

The Housing Ombudsman publishes guidance explaining when it can help residents and what complaint steps usually need to happen first. Check the current guidance rather than assuming a repair report alone has completed the complaints process.

Source: Housing Ombudsman

Keep a proportionate, useful record

• Repair and contractor reference numbers
• Original reports and formal complaint correspondence
• Appointment and access history
• Before-and-after photographs
• A room impact diary and a list of unresolved actions

Source: Shelter England