Repairs & Improvements

Repairs

Repairs to your home

This information is for you if you are an Islington council tenant or leaseholder and you are not in a TMO, Co-op or PFI property. If you live elsewhere, go to the main Repairs page to find the relevant information.

Homes for Islington are responsible for most repairs to the structure of your home and for essential services. Your tenancy conditions or lease agreement set out in detail what we will do and what you must do.

In general,

We are responsible for:

• Essential repairs to empty homes before new tenants move in
• Maintenance work at regular intervals (for example, lifts and heating)
• Major improvements to home, building, block or estate
• If you are a tenant, repairs to your home that are not listed in the section below

Tenants are responsible for:

• Inside doors and glazing
• Inside fittings including:
  • skirting boards
  • architraves to doors and windows
  • bath panels
  • toilet seats
  • plugs and chains to sinks and baths
  • curtain rails and pelmets
• Inside decorations and finishes
• Repairs to doors and drawers of kitchen units
• Letter boxes
• Items you, your family or visitors have damaged
• Repairs to any improvements you have carried out
• Replacing light bulbs and fluorescent tubes
• Replacing tap washers and plumbing installed for washing machines and dishwashers
• Changing locks due to loss of keys

Leaseholders are also responsible for:

• Plumbing inside your home
• Electrics inside your home, including your doorbell
• Independent central heating system, heaters and fires
• Floorboards and tiles
• Partitions inside your home
• Plasterboard and plastering
• Repairs to the entrance door to your home
• Chimney sweeping

Access to your home
In an emergency please let our workers and contractors in immediately. If we cannot contact you in an emergency we may need to force entry. In this case, we will not leave without securing your home and will leave our contact details.

If we need to access your home for any reason, other than an emergency, we will also contact you to request an appointment giving you at least 48 hours’ notice.

Tenant’s Right to Repairs
The Right to Repair is a piece of legislation that was introduced in 1994.
It means that landlords are responsible for doing small urgent repairs if they are likely to affect someone’s health, safety or security. It only includes repairs that cost less than £250. For further information and a list of qualifying repairs see "Tenant’s Right to Repairs"

Homes for Islington repairs pledge
We have introduced a pledge to tenants that our contractors will complete certain types of repairs to your home within 25 working days of us ordering the job. If our contractor does not complete the work within this time, you have the right to ask us to appoint another contractor to do the job.

The pledge covers most of our day-to-day repairs. A special leaflet ‘Housing Repairs’ tells you what the pledge covers and how you can use it. Please contact the reception at your area housing office for a copy.

Missed appointments compensation scheme
This scheme compensates Homes for Islington residents for missed non-urgent appointments. The scheme only applies to HFI residents who receive their repair services from HFI through HFI Direct. It does not apply to TMOs or PFI properties. For details click Missed appointments compensation scheme

Redecorating your home
You are responsible for decorating the inside of your home.

However if you are a HFI tenant aged 70 years or over, or disabled and receiving a recognised Disability Allowance we may be able help you under our Elderly and Disabled Persons’ Internal Decoration Programme. Under the programme we decorate part of your home every seven years. There is a waiting list for this service and as our budget is limited so we are not able to help everyone that applies to the programme.

Please ask at your area housing office for more details on the programme.

Your home improvements
You have the right to improve your property, but there are conditions and you must get our written permission before you start work. Please apply to your area housing office for permission, which we will not unreasonably withhold.

This includes:

• Making any alteration or additions to the property, its fixtures and fittings or services to the property
• Putting an aerial or a satellite dish on the outside of the property
• Putting a security gate on your front door
• Decorating the outside of your home
• Installing laminate flooring (Permission will not normally be given for tenants living in flats unless it is a ground floor property)

If you start work without permission, we can charge you for any repairs or ask you to restore your home to its original condition. You must also get any necessary approvals such as planning permission, building regulation approval before you start work.

For more information please contact the Tenancy Management Adviser at your area housing office.

Our improvements
The government has set a target for all social housing to meet a minimum standard by 2010. This is called the Decent Homes Standard. If you are a leaseholder you can get specific advice on how this affects you by clicking on Major Works.

Your home will need to meet the current minimum standard for housing, be in a reasonable state of repair, have reasonably modern facilities and services and provide a reasonable degree of thermal comfort.

HFI wants to deliver a higher standard than the Decent Homes Standard. We aim to keep your home in as good a condition as possible. So we may need to carry out work to modernise or upgrade your home or surroundings, including estates.

Before starting any work, we will consult you on what we plan to do. We will:

• Send you a letter
• Write to your Tenants’ and Residents’ Association (if there is one) or call a public meeting for all those likely to be affected by the work
• Tell you the result of consultation and keep you informed about progress

For more information click on Improvement Works.