Housing trust sends repeated letters to incorrect address

Irvings Law have successfully represented a client in a data breach compensation claim against a Housing Association; the client wishes to remain anonymous for the purposes of this case report and as such will be referred to as ‘CB’.

Discovery

CB had an ongoing complaint with her Housing Association in regards to her tenancy. As CB was not satisfied with the initial response to her complaint, she escalated her said complaint to the next stage of the Housing Association’s complaint procedure. CB became concerned when she received correspondence from the Housing Association stating her complaint had been resolved. Given CB did not consider the complaint resolved, she raised a further complaint with the Housing Ombudsman. The Housing Ombudsman subsequently wrote to the Housing Association asking them to detail to CB what has and what is going on with her complaint.

Following this, it became apparent that the Housing Association had on two occasions sent correspondence relating to CB and her complaint to the wrong address. Once they realised the error, the Housing Association acknowledged their mistake and offered their apologies. CB was not satisfied with this response and instead contacted our specialist Data Protection firm to take over this issue for her.

Representation

CB proceeded to instruct Yvonne Dobson at Irvings Law, and was offered no win, no fee terms. Yvonne then submitted a Letter of Claim to the employer on behalf of CB. The Letter of Claim alleged that the Housing Association in question had breached the Data Protection Act 2018 / General Data Protection Regulations 2018, had infringed CB’s Human Rights, breached confidence and also misused private information.

The Housing Association acknowledged receipt of the Letter of Claim and subsequently instructed solicitors.

Resolution

In their Letter of Response, the Housing Association accepted that they had sent correspondence to the wrong address, but as they believed the correspondence has not been read by the person who received it, CB had not suffered any distress or inconvenience. Given that the Housing Association felt CB had not suffered any distress or inconvenience, they invited CB on two separate occasions to discontinue her claim.

Yvonne did not think the response from the Housing Association was satisfactory or acceptable so engaged in further lengthy correspondence with them. Following this, the Housing Association then made an initial low offer of compensation to CB. Yvonne provided advice to CB in regards to the estimated value of her Claim and advised CB to reject the Housing Association’s offer. CB followed Yvonne’s advice and after this, a series of further negotiations then ensured, during which the Housing Association offered CB £1,250.00 in compensation plus her legal costs. In light of the valuation advice previously provided to CB by Yvonne, CB accepted this.