Awaab's Law Penalties & Enforcement

Who Enforces Awaab's Law?

Awaab's Law does not operate in isolation. Enforcement sits across two principal bodies: the Housing Ombudsman Service and the Regulator of Social Housing. Each has distinct but complementary powers, and landlords need to understand both to appreciate the full scope of risk they carry when they fail to meet the statutory timescales for investigating and remediating hazards such as damp and mould.

The Housing Ombudsman deals with individual complaints from tenants. It examines whether a landlord has acted fairly, followed its own policies, and met its legal obligations. The Regulator of Social Housing, by contrast, takes a systemic view. It monitors whether registered providers are meeting the consumer standards, including the new requirements introduced by the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023, and can intervene where it identifies widespread or serious failures.

Housing Ombudsman: Powers and Orders

The Housing Ombudsman Service (HOS) is an independent body established under the Housing Act 1996. Every registered provider of social housing in England must be a member of the HOS scheme, meaning tenants of housing associations and council housing can escalate unresolved complaints to the Ombudsman free of charge.

When the Ombudsman investigates a complaint, it can make one of several findings. These are graded by severity:

• No maladministration— the landlord acted reasonably and in line with its obligations. No further action is required.
• Service failure— the landlord fell short of what could reasonably be expected, but the impact on the tenant was relatively limited. This is the lowest adverse finding and typically attracts compensation of between £100 and £600.
• Maladministration— the landlord failed to act appropriately, causing measurable detriment to the tenant. Compensation orders at this level commonly range from £600 to £2,000, though amounts above this are not unusual where the failings are prolonged.
• Severe maladministration— the most serious finding. It is reserved for cases where the landlord's failings are so significant that they had a profound and lasting impact on the tenant's health, wellbeing, or housing situation. Compensation for severe maladministration regularly exceeds £2,000 and can run into five figures in exceptional cases.

What Makes a Finding "Severe"?

The Ombudsman has published its remedies guidance, which sets out the factors it considers when deciding the severity of a finding. A finding of severe maladministration is typically made where the evidence shows one or more of the following:

• A prolonged failure to act, often spanning months or years, despite repeated reports from the tenant.
• Clear evidence that the tenant's physical or mental health was adversely affected.
• A failure to carry out a risk assessment when children, elderly residents, or immunocompromised individuals were living in the property.
• Dishonesty, record falsification, or a deliberate attempt to downplay the severity of the hazard.
• A complete failure to follow the landlord's own published policies and procedures.
• Evidence that the landlord was previously warned about the issue by inspectors, legal representatives, or its own staff and took no meaningful action.

By contrast, a standard maladministration finding is more likely where the landlord attempted to act but did so too slowly, used the wrong approach, or failed to communicate effectively with the tenant. The distinction matters because severe findings are published on the Ombudsman's website with the landlord named, and they are reported to the Regulator, which can then consider whether wider regulatory action is warranted.

Types of Ombudsman Orders

Beyond determining the level of maladministration, the Ombudsman can issue binding orders. These are not mere recommendations — landlords are legally required to comply. The most common types of orders include:

• Compensation orders— a direction to pay a specified sum to the tenant. The Ombudsman's updated remedies framework (effective from April 2024) significantly increased the typical compensation ranges. For damp and mould cases with a severe maladministration finding, compensation of £3,000 to £8,000 is now common, with higher amounts in cases involving health impacts on children.
• Remediation orders— a direction to complete specific repair works within a stated timescale. The Ombudsman can require the landlord to carry out an independent survey, engage a specialist contractor, or implement a particular technical solution.
• Policy review orders— a direction to review and amend the landlord's internal policies, procedures, or staff training. This is frequently ordered alongside compensation in cases where the failure was systemic rather than a one-off error.
• Apology orders— a direction to issue a formal written apology to the tenant, often at a senior level (for example, from the chief executive or director of housing).
• Self-assessment orders— a direction to carry out a wider review of similar cases in the landlord's portfolio and report back to the Ombudsman with findings.

Compensation Levels: What Published Decisions Tell Us

The Housing Ombudsman publishes its determinations, and these provide the best guide to the compensation levels landlords can expect. The following are representative examples drawn from published decisions (landlord names are included as they appear in the public record, though specific tenant details are always anonymised):

• In a 2024 determination concerning a large housing association in the North West, the Ombudsman found severe maladministration in the landlord's handling of damp and mould. The tenant had reported black mould in the bedroom and bathroom in 2021. Despite multiple repair visits, the root cause was not addressed for over two years. The child living in the property developed respiratory symptoms. The Ombudsman ordered compensation of £5,700 plus completion of all remedial works within eight weeks.
• In another 2024 case involving a London borough, the Ombudsman found maladministration after the council took 14 months to complete a damp investigation. Compensation of £1,350was ordered, along with a requirement to review the council's damp and mould response procedures.
• A Midlands housing association received a severe maladministration finding in 2023 after failing to act on seven separate damp reports over three years. The Ombudsman ordered £7,200 in compensation, a senior-level apology, and a full independent stock condition survey of all properties in the same block.

These figures should be understood as a floor, not a ceiling. The Ombudsman has indicated that compensation will continue to increase as the expectations on landlords rise under Awaab's Law. Landlords who breach the statutory timescales — 24 hours for emergencies, 10 working days for an investigation and action plan, 12 weeks for completion of works — can expect the Ombudsman to take a particularly dim view of any subsequent complaint.

The Regulator of Social Housing

The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) gained significantly expanded consumer regulation powers under the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023. Before this Act, the Regulator operated under a "serious detriment" test that limited its ability to intervene on individual property conditions. That restriction has been removed.

The RSH now actively monitors compliance with the consumer standards, which include requirements around property safety, decency, and responsiveness to repairs. In the context of Awaab's Law, the Regulator's powers include:

• Regulatory notices— formal notices requiring a landlord to take specified action within a set timescale to address non-compliance. These are published on the RSH website and can cause significant reputational damage.
• Compliance inspections— the RSH can inspect a landlord's properties, records, and procedures at any time. It has hired a substantial number of new inspectors specifically to carry out proactive inspections of property conditions.
• Performance improvement plans— the Regulator can require a landlord to develop and implement a performance improvement plan, with regular reporting to the RSH.
• Enforcement notices— in cases of serious or persistent non-compliance, the RSH can issue an enforcement notice that requires specific remedial action. Failure to comply can lead to further regulatory consequences.
• Management transfers and appointments— in extreme cases, the RSH can appoint a manager to take over the management of a landlord's properties, or transfer management to another provider. This is the most drastic intervention and is reserved for cases where there is evidence of systemic failure and an inability or unwillingness to put things right.

The Regulator has made clear that it expects landlords to have robust systems in place for recording, triaging, and resolving damp and mould complaints within the Awaab's Law timescales. Where inspections reveal that a landlord does not have adequate systems, or that its systems exist on paper but are not followed in practice, regulatory action will follow.

How Tenants Make Complaints

Understanding the complaints process is important for landlords because the way a complaint is handled can itself become the subject of an Ombudsman investigation. The process follows a defined path:

1. Report the issue to the landlord— the tenant reports the damp, mould, or other hazard to the landlord. This starts the Awaab's Law clock. The landlord must acknowledge the report and begin investigation within the statutory timescales.
2. Landlord's internal complaints procedure (Stage 1)— if the tenant is dissatisfied with the landlord's response, they can raise a formal complaint. The landlord must respond to a Stage 1 complaint within 10 working days (this is the Ombudsman's Complaint Handling Code requirement, separate from the Awaab's Law repair timescales).
3. Landlord's internal complaints procedure (Stage 2)— if the tenant remains dissatisfied, they can escalate to Stage 2. The landlord must respond within 20 working days. A senior manager or panel must review the complaint at this stage.
4. Housing Ombudsman— once the internal process is exhausted, the tenant can refer the complaint to the Housing Ombudsman. Since October 2022, tenants no longer need to wait eight weeks after completing the internal process — they can refer immediately once Stage 2 is complete. The Ombudsman can also accept complaints where the landlord has failed to provide a Stage 2 response within the required timescale.

Critically, landlords should note that the Complaint Handling Code is now mandatory. The Ombudsman monitors compliance with the Code through self-assessments and can issue Complaint Handling Failure Orders where a landlord's process does not meet the required standard. Failing to handle complaints properly is itself a form of service failure that the Ombudsman will factor into its overall assessment of a case.

Maladministration Findings: Consequences Beyond Compensation

Financial compensation is only one element of the consequences landlords face. Maladministration findings carry significant additional impacts:

• Publication and reputational damage— all Ombudsman determinations are published online. Severe maladministration findings frequently attract media attention, particularly in cases involving damp and mould following the public interest generated by the Awaab Ishak inquest.
• Referral to the Regulator— the Ombudsman routinely refers cases involving severe maladministration or evidence of systemic failure to the RSH. This can trigger a wider regulatory investigation.
• Sector scorecard and league tables— the Ombudsman publishes data on complaint volumes and outcomes for each landlord. Landlords with high volumes of maladministration findings appear in published reports, creating pressure from boards, tenants, and the media.
• Board and governance scrutiny— the Ombudsman can order a landlord's board to discuss specific findings and report back on what governance changes have been made. For housing associations, this can have implications for credit ratings and investor confidence.
• Tenant disrepair claims— an Ombudsman finding of maladministration does not prevent a tenant from also pursuing a disrepair claim through the courts. In practice, the Ombudsman's finding is often used as supporting evidence in litigation, making it harder for the landlord to defend the claim.

Real-World Outcomes: What Enforcement Looks Like in Practice

To illustrate the practical consequences, consider the following patterns observed across published Ombudsman and Regulator decisions:

A housing association in the North of England was subject to a regulatory notice in 2024 after the Regulator identified widespread failures in damp and mould management across its stock of approximately 12,000 homes. The RSH inspection found that the landlord's systems for recording and tracking damp reports were inadequate, that there was a backlog of over 800 outstanding damp cases, and that the average time to resolve a damp complaint was 26 weeks — more than double the 12-week limit under Awaab's Law. The regulatory notice required the landlord to appoint an independent specialist to review its entire damp and mould process, implement a new case management system, and report quarterly to the Regulator for a period of 18 months.

In a separate case, a London-based housing association received four severe maladministration findings within a single year relating to damp and mould in different properties. The cumulative compensation orders exceeded £20,000. More significantly, the Ombudsman issued a wider order requiring the landlord to conduct a comprehensive review of all damp and mould cases handled in the preceding 24 months, identify any where the statutory timescales had been breached, and proactively contact affected tenants to offer redress. The landlord was required to report compliance with this order within six months.

These examples demonstrate that enforcement is not theoretical. The combination of increased Ombudsman compensation, mandatory publication of findings, and proactive regulatory inspections means that landlords who fail to comply with Awaab's Law face real and escalating consequences.

How to Avoid Enforcement Action

The most effective way to avoid penalties is straightforward: comply with the statutory timescales and maintain robust systems for recording and resolving hazard reports. Specifically, landlords should:

• Ensure all damp and mould reports are logged on the same day they are received, with a clear audit trail showing when each statutory clock started.
• Have a defined triage process that identifies emergency hazards requiring a 24-hour response.
• Issue written Remediation Action Plans to tenants within 10 working days of every report.
• Track all cases against the 12-week completion deadline and escalate internally where deadlines are at risk.
• Train frontline staff, repairs operatives, and complaints handlers on the Awaab's Law requirements.
• Maintain detailed records of all inspections, communications, and works carried out — these are the evidence base that will be reviewed if a complaint reaches the Ombudsman.
• Handle complaints in strict accordance with the Complaint Handling Code to prevent procedural failures adding to the severity of any finding.

Get Your Organisation Compliant

The penalties for getting Awaab's Law wrong are significant and growing. Whether you are a housing association, an ALMO, or a local authority, the expectations are the same: act quickly, act effectively, and keep records that demonstrate compliance. Organisations that invest in proper systems, training, and templates now will be far better positioned to withstand scrutiny from the Ombudsman and the Regulator.