A wheelchair user has not been able to enter or leave her flat for over a week after a new door was installed.
Sarah Williams, 47, had a new door fitted by housing associates, which had a self-closing mechanism at the entrance of the property.
But she says the new fitting means she is unable to pass through alone and needs her husband's assistance, as the wheelchair gets stuck when passing through.
Sarah was last out on Friday October 7, and returned home at around 6.30pm to find the new mechanism had been fitted to her door at the top of the disabled ramp which she uses to enter her property.
As it was Friday evening, Sarah had to wait until Monday to call Greenoak Housing Association, but she was met with delays by the company to resolve her situation.
Sarah claims, at one point a Greenoak member of staff told her she needed to provide documentation such as medical reports or information from an occupational therapist.
The 47-year-old was also asked to give information on why she required a door that didn't have a self-closing mechanism, which she found particularly intrusive.
Sarah told SurreyLive : "It should be an absolute given that I require safe entry and exit to the property, and to not be disadvantaged. Why should I have to give even more personal private medical information to my landlords?”
“It's just not reasonable, and, anyway, I don't have that documentation. There never was a report done on the entry access door, because it had previously been accessible."
Sarah, who has been living at the property for 15 years, took the case to Surrey Coalition of Disabled People.
She said that they then made an urgent safeguarding referral on her behalf to social services at Surrey County Council, but that she had still not heard back from them 24 hours later when she spoke with us on Thursday (October 13).
In the meantime, the situation has left her feeling extremely anxious.
"If there was a fire here when I was on my own, I couldn't get out. I ended up having a massive panic attack on Wednesday, but, fortunately, one of my neighbours was working from home and heard me because my window was open, so she came straight down” she said.
"You start feeling like everyone is treating you like some kind of criminal, and you have to constantly prove yourself and prove your worth. It's just dehumanising - we're not even third-class citizens, we're just an inconvenience."
A spokesperson from Surrey County Council responded to the incident stating: "We take any safeguarding referrals very seriously. Whilst we cannot comment in detail on individual cases, we are in contact with this lady and providing support."
Adrian Smith, Greenoak's executive director of assets and building safety, said: "I have been in communication with our resident over the past week and have agreed a resolution to the access and egress issues, which became apparent upon the like-for-like replacement of the side door, at the block.”
“We have reduced the door closure to the minimum operational pressures possible for this product.”
He added: "We are in the process of procuring a DDA compliant replacement for the access door, which had been an oversight when replacing the door due to the resident’s specific access needs not being updated."
