The Housing Ombudsman has released its latest 'learning from severe maladministration' report, focusing on adaptations and landlords' response to mental and physical health needs. 

With the important role that social housing has to play in giving safe and secure housing to millions, the learning in these reports should help landlords provide effective services that protect this aspiration. 

The report is based on 35 investigations where residents have asked for an adaptation to the home or service adjustment.

Adaptations include using facilities like kitchens or bathrooms or service changes because of vulnerabilities.

The report examines how landlords have managed adaptations, including liaising with Occupational Health, communication with residents and making reasonable adjustments under the Equality Act.  

In one case a landlord failed to install adaptations 27 months after it was told there was urgent need for them because a child was going through chemotherapy.

In other cases, a resident was largely confined to one room because of trouble accessing rooms in their wheelchair for eight years and another landlord did not provide adequate evacuation plans for a disabled resident in case of a fire.

There are also cases of residents not being communicated with effectively – including an autistic resident who suffering significant distress failed to make reasonable adjustments when communicating with her. 

This report comes a year after the Ombudsman's Spotlight report on attitudes, respect and rights, which highlighted many of the issues it sees in dealing with vulnerabilities and called on landlords to develop human-centric service provision. 

Landlords highlighted in this report are: 

• Bristol City Council 
• Clarion 
• Kingston upon Thames Council 
• Lambeth Council 
• Longhurst Group 
• L&Q 
• Rooftop Housing Group 
• Somerset Council 
• Southern Housing 
• Southwark Council 
• Sovereign Network Group 
• VIVID