Dubbo resident Marlene Jones is urging Housing NSW to speed up their maintenance requests after a recent incident left her worried for her safety.
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On Monday afternoon, Ms Jones’ grandson accidentally broke a window while playing PlayStation in the house. Ms Jones said she immediately called Housing NSW’s maintenance line for the pane to be repaired.
As the window is located at the front of the house, Ms Jones said she was worried about the safety of herself and her grandsons if anyone saw the broken glass and use it to get into the house.
The broken glass on the floor also posed a risk to the young children, she said.
However, after calling four times between 2pm and 9pm, Ms Jones said she was told no one would be able to fix the window or remove the glass and board it up until the following day.
In response to the incident, Housing NSW told the Daily Liberal maintenance requests were categorised and given an expected response time.
“The expected response times are: 24 to 48 hours for problems that need prompt action because of safety or security (e.g. no internal working lights, blocked external drains, stoves or hot water heaters not working) [or] 20 days for general repairs and maintenance requests that cannot wait for planned works,” Housing NSW said.
However, Ms Jones said it wasn’t good enough.
“It was a horrible night. I stayed up for most of the night listening to make sure no one came in. I was worried someone would come though the window,” she said.
“I’ve had things stolen from the front yard before and I had to tie up the front gate because it doesn’t lock.”
Ms Jones said she would have been satisfied with a temporary fix such as the pane being removed and the window boarded up before the glass was replaced at a later date. However, on Tuesday she was told it would be another 24 hours before it would be fixed.
“There’s got to be a complete overhaul of the system,” she said.
It was not the first time she had waited for days for something to be fixed, the resident said.