"Nothing ever gets done" Blind man left for days without working toilet in flat

A resident has said that the company that looks after his building is STILL drastically failing its tenants despite promising to change.

Former mental health nurse Andy Smith, who lives at Mayer House in Chatham Place, said that the housing association company Peabody which owns the building has fallen short on every complaint from its inhabitants.

The most recent issue left Mr Smith without a working toilet for the whole of the May bank holiday weekend.

"I had a frank conversation with Peebody over the phone and the woman admitted that the drainage system in Mayer House wasn't up to standard," he said.

"A guy down the corridor from me got flooded with sewage last Friday so it's obviously still having an effect."

Mr Smith said that there have been multiple occasions where toilets in the building have flooded with sewage.

After the same thing happened to Mr Smith’s bathroom, the company that dealt with the former blockages called him and said that Peabody had stopped them from flushing the main pipes since they gained ownership of the property.

Peabody has subsequently failed to remove limescale from the pipes meaning that two flats remain empty and many others are at risk of blockages.

"They're beyond the pale really. My toilet wasn't flushing once a day but then over the bank holiday weekend it stopped working completely," Mr Smith said.

Mr Smith said that he was left without a working toilet for three days and there was no emergency process to get anything done about it.

"It's just getting so frustrating. Their lack of action is just remarkable, my next step is to re-email the local councillors about all these problems."

Mr Smith, who is visually impaired, previously said that Peabody also hasn’t been understanding about his disability, and even refused to send him his letters in a larger print.

The person on the phone allegedly used the excuse that she ‘didn’t know how to’ when he pressed why she couldn’t do this.

They also took a very long time to install special lights to help Mr Smith’s sight. It took them 10 months to fit lighting that would help his quality of life.

"The fact that they haven't maintained the pipes in the flats is just awful. I can't see them changing without any consequences," he said.

"Nothing ever gets done. They are consistently crap, it's remarkable. To be blind and not having a working toilet is just too stressful."

A spokesperson for Peabody said: “We’re really sorry for the issues Mr Smith has been having and we’re working hard to resolve them as soon as possible.”