Complaints and Feedback
Complaints and Feedback
At Local Space, we work hard to provide an excellent service to all our customers. However, there may be times when we do not get it right.
We want to hear your feedback, suggestions and complaints so that we can improve our services.
If you are a Newham Council tenant and your complaint is about a tenancy issue (such as repairs or antisocial behaviour) you will need to contact Newham Council directly to make a complaint. If you are unsure whether to make your complaint to Newham or Local Space, please contact us.
Our complaints process
Before making a formal complaint, we would like to hear about the issue so it can be resolved promptly and informally with a member of Local Space staff.
We will treat this as a service request, which will be documented, monitored and reviewed. If we cannot resolve the issue as a service request, we will treat it as a formal complaint and escalate it to stage one of the complaints process.
We have a two-stage complaints process:
Stage one
If the service request cannot be resolved, we will refer it to a manager to formally investigate. The manager will develop an action plan with you and the responsible officer. This will normally take no more than 10 working days and we will always let you know if it will take longer and why.
If you are not satisfied with our stage one response, you have 10 working days to tell us that you want to take it further. You will need to tell us what the outstanding issues are and what outcome you are looking for.
Stage two
If the stage one complaint cannot be resolved, a senior member of staff at Local Space (this will likely be a Head of Service or Senior Management Team member) will work with you to achieve a satisfactory resolution. This will normally take no more than 20 working days and we will always let you know if it will take longer and why.
Our complaints policy sets out what happens in more detail when you make a complaint to us.
The Housing Ombudsman
If you are still not satisfied with our response at the end of our complaints process, you can ask the Housing Ombudsman Service to investigate your complaint.
The Housing Ombudsman Service does not usually investigate complaints if a customer has not been through a formal complaints process, but they can take steps to encourage landlords and customers to work together to resolve a complaint.
The Housing Ombudsman will investigate your complaint and write to you and us with their decision and any recommendations.
You can contact the Housing Ombudsman online or by post, phone, or email:
- Housing Ombudsman Service, Exchange Tower, Harbour Exchange Square, London, E14 9GE.
- 0300 111 3000 (check call charges – lines are open Monday to Friday from 9.15am to 5.15pm).
- info@housing-ombudsman.org.uk
The Housing Ombudsman Service published a new Complaint Handling Code in April 2024, setting out good practice that will allow landlords to respond to complaints effectively and fairly.
We have undertaken a thorough self-assessment and equality impact assessment to ensure that our complaints process is accessible to all our customers. We have also used data analysis and insights from customer complaints to set out actions to improve services to our customers in our complaints performance and service improvement report, which our Board has responded to and set out key areas of improvement. This proactive approach underscores our commitment to transparency, fairness, and inclusivity in addressing any concerns our customers may have.
Tenant Satisfaction Measures
Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSMs) are a way for us to see how happy and safe our customers are in their homes. The measures aim to improve the standard of housing at Local Space.