THE region’s largest registered social landlord has apologised to a tenant who complained about her neighbour’s antisocial behaviour.

And Scottish Borders Housing Association (SBHA), which has more than 5,500 rented properties, says it has “taken on board” the lessons learned from a finding issued last week by the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO).

The watchdog had investigated the case of the tenant – referred to as Miss C – who was dissatisfied with the way the association had handled her complaint.

The SPSO report stated: “We upheld Miss C’s complaints. We found that the association took steps in line with its procedures by making contact with Miss C and her neighbour.

“When Miss C further complained…the association noted that not enough had been done to investigate Miss C’s concerns and undertook to investigate further.

“However, we found no evidence of any further investigation having been carried out or further action taken.”

The watchdog recommended that SBHA should apologise to Miss C “for a failure to adequately recognise and investigate complaints about the operation of a business, antisocial behaviour and sub-letting”.

The SPSO also demanded that the association should take steps to ensure its staff are aware of the need to record and investigate complaints properly.

A spokesperson for SBHA said: “We take the handling of complaints and antisocial behaviour very seriously.

“Our teams work hard to ensure all complaints to us are thoroughly investigated.

“This is particularly reflected in the significant improvement achieved in the resolution of antisocial behaviour cases over the last three years – from 69 per cent of cases successfully resolved within agreed targets to 82 per cent, despite an increase in the number of incident reported.

“We do, however, recognise that the handling of the complaint did not meet our expected standards.

“In the next couple of months, our teams will be participating in a customer service programme which will provide further training to staff on improving services to – and communication with – our customers. 

“Late last year, we introduced new technology to increase our ability to track the progress of enquires and cases raised against outcomes.

“We have taken on board the lessons learned from this case and continue to review our procedures in order to improve the customer experience.”