Tenant broken boiler, refusing me access to check it
Discussion
t the bed…. pincher said:
I'm almost willing to bet that you roll over and pay up...
Say you've got two options;1) Pay her new landlord £800 and get rid of her quickly
2) Take her to court at a cost of between £1000-1500, which could take 6-12 month and in the meantime you could potentially receive no rent either.
Which option would you go down if all you wanted to do was get the tenant out, get the property back, get it tidied up and get it up for sale?
Groat said:
LOL!! So do I, because when you start drilling into it it just makes no sense whatsoever.
The way UC HB operates the tenant DOES get the first rent sent to them. So naturally the initial process is watched like a hawk.
UC even in the midst of the pandemic haven't been in the slightest difficult to contact, nor do they "play difficult" with landlords/agents when they are contacted.
So if that FIRST PAYMENT is not paid over pdq by the tenant, UC are immediately informed by UC47 which requests further rent sent direct to landlord/agent, plus sanction on the rent thief's income benefit over a period of months till the stolen amount is repaid.
The thief has only one way to cease the sanction, which is to move.
Of course there's also an agent here who either knows nothing about UC processes or else is also howling at UC to get the matter sorted.
Pretending all this guff about tenant got initially safeguarded rent sent direct to her or UC wouldn't deal with the agent is just that - pretending.
Ok once in a blue moon UC does blunder and sends a rent that's supposed to be safeguarded to the tenant in error. But that's quite a big deal and brings UC management into things and all kinds of dramas and is NEVER and I mean NEVER either not taken seriously or left to just drift on into further payment after payment to the tenant.
TEN MONTHS!!!! Naaaaa. It's a wind up.
Sadly it's not a windup. The way UC HB operates the tenant DOES get the first rent sent to them. So naturally the initial process is watched like a hawk.
UC even in the midst of the pandemic haven't been in the slightest difficult to contact, nor do they "play difficult" with landlords/agents when they are contacted.
So if that FIRST PAYMENT is not paid over pdq by the tenant, UC are immediately informed by UC47 which requests further rent sent direct to landlord/agent, plus sanction on the rent thief's income benefit over a period of months till the stolen amount is repaid.
The thief has only one way to cease the sanction, which is to move.
Of course there's also an agent here who either knows nothing about UC processes or else is also howling at UC to get the matter sorted.
Pretending all this guff about tenant got initially safeguarded rent sent direct to her or UC wouldn't deal with the agent is just that - pretending.
Ok once in a blue moon UC does blunder and sends a rent that's supposed to be safeguarded to the tenant in error. But that's quite a big deal and brings UC management into things and all kinds of dramas and is NEVER and I mean NEVER either not taken seriously or left to just drift on into further payment after payment to the tenant.
TEN MONTHS!!!! Naaaaa. It's a wind up.
Tomorrow they'll be 8 month in arrears.
It's been a combination of us not knowing what we're doing and not understanding the processes surrounding Universal Credit, and bad advice from a letting agent who kept reminding us that UC were slow to make payments and that we should give it more time.
eldar said:
Good move. Priorities are get the rent paid directly to you. This shouldn't de difficult.
Small claim for outstanding rent, as you know where they live. Once they've moved, more difficult.
Get gas cut off as you cannot verify safety. Likewise power if it wasn't been certified as recent legislation requires.
Stop being nice. Play hardball, within the law.
Getting rent payments shouldn't be difficult, but I suspect it's going to be. As with last time, I suspect the tenant will do something that changes their circumstances and results in them having to start a new claim. That's exactly what happened last time. Literally days after UC telling us that we were setup to receive payment, the tenants circumstances changed which resulted in them having to start a new claim. In our case, UC didn't tell us that it had happened, so we sat here waiting for a payment after the letting agent told us UC were slow and to keep waiting a little longer. In the end, I contacted UC and they said "oh yes, the tenants circumstances changed".Small claim for outstanding rent, as you know where they live. Once they've moved, more difficult.
Get gas cut off as you cannot verify safety. Likewise power if it wasn't been certified as recent legislation requires.
Stop being nice. Play hardball, within the law.
eldar said:
Escalate this, they are misleading you. The tenant has stolen 8 months rent, the benefits office must act properly.
You've been advised the best people to engage, do that now. You were advised so, ages ago, but ignored it. Do you actually want them out?
Who is it I've been advised to engage?You've been advised the best people to engage, do that now. You were advised so, ages ago, but ignored it. Do you actually want them out?
Groat said:
If a second payment of rent authorised as safeguarded is negligently sent the matter escalates itself to management.
O and if you re-read 1st post it's NINE months regardless of what Mr Sheep thinks.
Of course UC have to be made aware of all this carry-on to be able to deal with it, so for months, prior to the agent being appointed, nobody was apparently bothered to let UC know.
I don't know nor does anyone else I know, what happens if a 3rd safeguarded rent is sent in error to tenant. In the old days it'd be escalated to senior HB management. But if its not the same (and even if it was) I think if they gifted 3 payments to a thief I'd be on to local MP to initiate a red flag enquiry which, in the old days, would shut obligate it to be dealt with immediately.
Actually after payment 3 I'd also get further payments suspended until it was sorted out and then payment paid out appropriately (ie to me).
Then there's the agents. He was told to get an agent experienced in dealing with this type of issue and tenancy. Instead he gets a conman who makes an agreement to be retained on monthly fee. Bonkers! And then seems to have gone about showing Mr Sheep why it was important to get an agent experienced in dealing with this type of issue and tenancy.
There's still hope in this. But I don't think Mr Sheep is much interested any more. So next it's lose all hope of getting anything out of it by evicting the tenant etc etc.
AFAIK right now getting that done quickly in England is a bit tricky, so you're certainly talking months. Months of rent which COULD be stacking up in a suspension account at UC, but heeeeeyyyyy! Why do that when you can get a few more payments to the thief?
It's a wind up.
As I've already mentioned, I found a letting agent would take a property on in this area Sadly many of the letting agents around here won't touch them, so my options were limited.O and if you re-read 1st post it's NINE months regardless of what Mr Sheep thinks.
Of course UC have to be made aware of all this carry-on to be able to deal with it, so for months, prior to the agent being appointed, nobody was apparently bothered to let UC know.
I don't know nor does anyone else I know, what happens if a 3rd safeguarded rent is sent in error to tenant. In the old days it'd be escalated to senior HB management. But if its not the same (and even if it was) I think if they gifted 3 payments to a thief I'd be on to local MP to initiate a red flag enquiry which, in the old days, would shut obligate it to be dealt with immediately.
Actually after payment 3 I'd also get further payments suspended until it was sorted out and then payment paid out appropriately (ie to me).
Then there's the agents. He was told to get an agent experienced in dealing with this type of issue and tenancy. Instead he gets a conman who makes an agreement to be retained on monthly fee. Bonkers! And then seems to have gone about showing Mr Sheep why it was important to get an agent experienced in dealing with this type of issue and tenancy.
There's still hope in this. But I don't think Mr Sheep is much interested any more. So next it's lose all hope of getting anything out of it by evicting the tenant etc etc.
AFAIK right now getting that done quickly in England is a bit tricky, so you're certainly talking months. Months of rent which COULD be stacking up in a suspension account at UC, but heeeeeyyyyy! Why do that when you can get a few more payments to the thief?
It's a wind up.
I've already spoken with UC, they've not suspended the tenants payments, but they've logged the situation as a possible overpayment of benefits to the claimant and I'm waiting to hear back to see what they're planning to do about it.
Not much of an update, but we've finally managed to get Universal Credit to setup payment to us.
I submitted a UC47 back in January, but the tenants circumstances changes days later and the payment arrangement was cancelled without anyone telling me. I submitted another UC47, and after not hearing anything from UC I spent 3-4 weeks constantly ringing them to get it sorted. Apparently they had no record of my second UC47 despite me providing evidence that I'd submitted it successfully via their website. Got a phone call a couple of days ago to finally confirm they've setup up the rent to come to us as from next month, along with extra payment to arrears.
We've also heard that the local council has set aside £6m which they're going to use the buy some of the properties, knock them down and sell the land onto developers. We're hoping that doesn't impact our ability to sell the property, because who's going to buy it knowing that potentially could be pulled down in the not so distant future. If we had some idea of when the council plans to start pulling these houses down, it might have made sense to leave the tenant in while we're getting rent and let the council buy it, but I suspect it could be years away.
Link to an article discussing regeneration of the area https://www.eastdurhamnews.co.uk/2021/03/23/6m-reg...
I submitted a UC47 back in January, but the tenants circumstances changes days later and the payment arrangement was cancelled without anyone telling me. I submitted another UC47, and after not hearing anything from UC I spent 3-4 weeks constantly ringing them to get it sorted. Apparently they had no record of my second UC47 despite me providing evidence that I'd submitted it successfully via their website. Got a phone call a couple of days ago to finally confirm they've setup up the rent to come to us as from next month, along with extra payment to arrears.
We've also heard that the local council has set aside £6m which they're going to use the buy some of the properties, knock them down and sell the land onto developers. We're hoping that doesn't impact our ability to sell the property, because who's going to buy it knowing that potentially could be pulled down in the not so distant future. If we had some idea of when the council plans to start pulling these houses down, it might have made sense to leave the tenant in while we're getting rent and let the council buy it, but I suspect it could be years away.
Link to an article discussing regeneration of the area https://www.eastdurhamnews.co.uk/2021/03/23/6m-reg...
Now that we're going to be getting rent, we were thinking of trying to sell the property with the tenant in place, but I guess that's going to be almost impossible if we can't get access to the property as we'll need photographs and I'm assuming any purchaser will want to carry out their own checks/survey.
So, another update.
In my last post I said that we'd managed to get a managed payment setup. Well, I still hadn't heard anything from that so I chased up Universal Credit and emailed a couple of people who's email addresses I still had from previous correspondence. On Friday, I got two emails from a guy at UC, the first said that the managed payment couldn't be processed because it wasn't on the correct form, then I got a second email minutes later to say that the managed payment had been stopped because the tenants circumstances had been changed. I've emailed the guy back to try and find out which reason it is.
We've already initiated court action, I'm just disappointed that it doesn't look like we're going to receive a penny in rent while that's ongoing (which could be months).
I must say however, that our experience with Universal Credit has been absolutely shocking. To save people reading through the whole thread, here's a bit of background.
When the tenant moved in, rent was paid by UC directly to us. After a few month the tenant changed it so that they would receive the rent. Back in January we submitted a UC47 and received confirmation that it had been setup. After a couple of months of no payments from UC I chased it up, only to be told by UC that the tenants circumstances had changed and the direct payment/managed payment had been stopped. Nobody had told me about it. In April I submitted another UC47, but based on previous experience I rang UC almost weekly to chase things up. Each time I rang I was told that it was with another department and someone would call me back, no-one ever called me back. Then one day, out of the blue, a lady from UC rang me to try and help, she said they didn't receive the UC47 but not to worry as she's put the details in based on an old UC47 but with updated information (outstanding rent etc). It looks like either she messed that up, or the tenant has had this payment arrangement cancelled as well.
So essentially there's a number of cock-ups. The first, UC (in my opinion) shouldn't allow tenants to change the rent to be paid to them. The second problem was that my request for direct payment was successfully setup but then cancelled without telling me. The third problems was that not a single person I spoke to at UC told me that there was no UC47 on the system when I kept ringing for progress, so we went on for a couple of month when all I had to do was submit another form. Finally, I have no idea whether the person who setup the last management payment over the phone messed up, or if somehow the tenant knows a workaround which forced their circumstances to change and managed payments to be cancelled. The whole experience with UC has been a complete shambles.
I'm praying that the tenant digs their heels in and stays in the property until the bailiffs turn up to turf them out, because I'll be there, taking in the pleasure of seeing them being turfed out onto the street like the rubbish that they are.
In my last post I said that we'd managed to get a managed payment setup. Well, I still hadn't heard anything from that so I chased up Universal Credit and emailed a couple of people who's email addresses I still had from previous correspondence. On Friday, I got two emails from a guy at UC, the first said that the managed payment couldn't be processed because it wasn't on the correct form, then I got a second email minutes later to say that the managed payment had been stopped because the tenants circumstances had been changed. I've emailed the guy back to try and find out which reason it is.
We've already initiated court action, I'm just disappointed that it doesn't look like we're going to receive a penny in rent while that's ongoing (which could be months).
I must say however, that our experience with Universal Credit has been absolutely shocking. To save people reading through the whole thread, here's a bit of background.
When the tenant moved in, rent was paid by UC directly to us. After a few month the tenant changed it so that they would receive the rent. Back in January we submitted a UC47 and received confirmation that it had been setup. After a couple of months of no payments from UC I chased it up, only to be told by UC that the tenants circumstances had changed and the direct payment/managed payment had been stopped. Nobody had told me about it. In April I submitted another UC47, but based on previous experience I rang UC almost weekly to chase things up. Each time I rang I was told that it was with another department and someone would call me back, no-one ever called me back. Then one day, out of the blue, a lady from UC rang me to try and help, she said they didn't receive the UC47 but not to worry as she's put the details in based on an old UC47 but with updated information (outstanding rent etc). It looks like either she messed that up, or the tenant has had this payment arrangement cancelled as well.
So essentially there's a number of cock-ups. The first, UC (in my opinion) shouldn't allow tenants to change the rent to be paid to them. The second problem was that my request for direct payment was successfully setup but then cancelled without telling me. The third problems was that not a single person I spoke to at UC told me that there was no UC47 on the system when I kept ringing for progress, so we went on for a couple of month when all I had to do was submit another form. Finally, I have no idea whether the person who setup the last management payment over the phone messed up, or if somehow the tenant knows a workaround which forced their circumstances to change and managed payments to be cancelled. The whole experience with UC has been a complete shambles.
I'm praying that the tenant digs their heels in and stays in the property until the bailiffs turn up to turf them out, because I'll be there, taking in the pleasure of seeing them being turfed out onto the street like the rubbish that they are.
Edited by TheBinarySheep on Monday 5th July 15:06
sevensfun said:
Just what I was thinking...
Interesting to hear if he believes this could have been done better...!
It probably could have been done better, but I've been on the phone to UC fairly regularly chasing things up. The main issue is that the agents on the other end of the phone don't give you much information and you have to sit and wait for someone in a back office somewhere to deal with it and get back to you.Interesting to hear if he believes this could have been done better...!
At the beginning of the year I listened to the letting agent and just say back and waited for UC to setup the payment. The letting agent kept telling me that UC can be slow. This time however, I've chased it up all of the time. It seems pointless going through the whole process again though if the tenant is just going to have their circumstances changed every time I get a management payment setup.
You would think that UC would be wise to tenants changing their circumstances in order to get managed payments cancelled.
Fastpedeller said:
I seem to recall that landlords were unable to evict (or time scale extended) due to Covid. In fact Covid has been a good excuse for 'normal procedures' to be forgotten/relaxed for some workplaces.
This is it. While we've not helped ourselves by leaving things too long before taking action, we still would have ended up well out of pocket. With the new eviction rules that came in as a result of Covid, it meant that you could issue a section 8 once your tenant was in 2 month of arrears, but you had to give the tenant 6 month notice. The alternative was to wait until the tenant was 6 month in arrears and then you could issue a section 8 with only 1 months notice.The tenant stopped paying rent back in October, if we'd been on the ball and issued a section 8 in November, we still would have had to wait until May before we could take any further action. I know that because of Covid the courts have a backlog, but let's assume that the court process would take 1 month, we'd still be looking at 9 month of receiving no rent that's around £3600 in lost rent, £1200 in mortgage payments, and £1500 in eviction costs... total cost £6,300 and that doesn't include any repairs we're going to need to do either.
As it stands, because we messed about and delayed, we're looking at a loss of around £7,000.
It's been pointed out many times in this thread that we've made mistakes, and I'm happy to hold me hand up and agree. However, the existing system that's in place is far too biased towards tenants, and I think our situation highlights that given that even if we'd done everything right and had been on the ball, we'd still be looking at fairly hefty losses. We're just normal people living on an ex-council estate, we're not rich, but thankful that we're in a position where these losses won't massively impact us on a day to day basis, but with that being said, it's not right that it's so easy for tenants to be able to effectively steal thousands from another individual and there be absolutely no punishment for it. These tenants will move onto another sucker landlords and rinse and repeat.
Thankfully, we don't stress about it anymore. It is what it is, and eventually we'll get it sorted out. We'll take the financial hit and move on with our lives. As long us and kids are healthy, then anything else is a bonus.
Edited by TheBinarySheep on Wednesday 7th July 10:31
bennno said:
You are overstating this, you are not out of pocket for the mortgage payment as you'd have paid that to achieve the rent. Also how much deposit did you take and what will you be entitled to keep in circumstances?
What are your options re debt recovery, can you go small claims court, might mean you get some back, worst case the nightmare tennant gets a CCJ
If you think in terms of exactly what it has cost us, then yes, we're only about £2,800 - £3,000 out of pocket, that's with us paying the mortgage and legal fees. What are your options re debt recovery, can you go small claims court, might mean you get some back, worst case the nightmare tennant gets a CCJ
Because we're in negative equity with this property, the rent payments were allocated to also being paid off the mortgage. We're still left in a position were we are personally going to have to fund that shortfall.
Regardless of how accurate my figures are, it still highlights that landlords have very little protection against tenants like this, even more so in run down areas where good tenants are extremely difficult to come by.
As for trying to recover the arrears, we'd just be throwing more money away, and the tenants probably know that.
Hawkshaw said:
OP it seems to me that you have been very unlucky through all of this, not that that excuses the tenant's behaviour, but I think you should get some professional advice from a lawyer who specialises in this area, if you can find such a person.
Surely the tenancy agreement allows the landlord to enter the premises subject to notice to carry out inspection and repairs? If the tenant is repeatedly obstructing that, then they are in breach. Can you use that as a basis for eviction? Just a thought.
We're already past that stage now, they've already been issued with notice and the process of taking them to court to get possession has already been started.Surely the tenancy agreement allows the landlord to enter the premises subject to notice to carry out inspection and repairs? If the tenant is repeatedly obstructing that, then they are in breach. Can you use that as a basis for eviction? Just a thought.
Groat said:
LOL!
The thing only ever needed managed by someone who knows how to handle that type of tenancy, and who knows how to deal with UC claims.
But it seems there's no such agent available in this particular area, although it begs the question of how anyone else is managing to operate successfully in this allegedly run-down area which is likely to have many UC claimants.
As to the UC claim itself, the first defaulted/missing rent payment SHOULD HAVE prompted communication with UC. The default reported by online form, and request made for subsequent direct payment plus sanction for outstanding amount. Contact SHOULD HAVE been established with the tenant's case manager at as early a stage as possible, and regular communication continued until the matter was resolved. Any further default SHOULD HAVE created an escalation of the matter to the supervisory level of case management, with case manager being copied into correspondence.
You do get the occasional inept-ish UC case manager, but inept supervisors are pretty rare. Odd though it may seem, they generally do take a bit of pride in their work - the sorting out of claims - and they are also all taxpayers like you or me and aren't generally at all amused by claimants gaming the UC system or defrauding it.
This is a once in a blue moon scenario that I've never experienced in 45 years of dealing with HB/DSS/UC tenancies. Since the advent of UC I've never had to go 'higher' than supervisor level to get a particularly difficult or complex matter sorted out but I suppose continuing the escalation beyond the supervisor would be the normal next step in the process.
Unfortunately the OP's still at the stage of playing email pingpong with randoms at UC rather than being at the stage of first name terms with case manager and supervisor who've provided him with direct mobile numbers etc etc etc so this one's probably got a good while to run.
"Well, I still hadn't heard anything from that so I chased up Universal Credit and emailed a couple of people who's email addresses I still had from previous correspondence. On Friday, I got two emails from a guy at UC, the first said that the managed payment couldn't be processed because it wasn't on the correct form, then I got a second email minutes later to say that the managed payment had been stopped because the tenants circumstances had been changed. I've emailed the guy back to try and find out which reason it is".
Anyway, here's hoping the eviction isn't being handled as ineptly as everything else. Hopefully it's not on the grounds of non-payment of rent. Because I wouldn't think it'd be very hard to defend seeing as there's an ongoing (albeit unresolved) matter of a claim for rent assistance in progress!!
Hey, you never know. That might just be the trigger for the resolve of the claim!
This is the issue with UC at the minute, I can't get past the person on the phone. They just say they can't pass me onto a manager/supervisor, if I want to complain I need to do it in writing.The thing only ever needed managed by someone who knows how to handle that type of tenancy, and who knows how to deal with UC claims.
But it seems there's no such agent available in this particular area, although it begs the question of how anyone else is managing to operate successfully in this allegedly run-down area which is likely to have many UC claimants.
As to the UC claim itself, the first defaulted/missing rent payment SHOULD HAVE prompted communication with UC. The default reported by online form, and request made for subsequent direct payment plus sanction for outstanding amount. Contact SHOULD HAVE been established with the tenant's case manager at as early a stage as possible, and regular communication continued until the matter was resolved. Any further default SHOULD HAVE created an escalation of the matter to the supervisory level of case management, with case manager being copied into correspondence.
You do get the occasional inept-ish UC case manager, but inept supervisors are pretty rare. Odd though it may seem, they generally do take a bit of pride in their work - the sorting out of claims - and they are also all taxpayers like you or me and aren't generally at all amused by claimants gaming the UC system or defrauding it.
This is a once in a blue moon scenario that I've never experienced in 45 years of dealing with HB/DSS/UC tenancies. Since the advent of UC I've never had to go 'higher' than supervisor level to get a particularly difficult or complex matter sorted out but I suppose continuing the escalation beyond the supervisor would be the normal next step in the process.
Unfortunately the OP's still at the stage of playing email pingpong with randoms at UC rather than being at the stage of first name terms with case manager and supervisor who've provided him with direct mobile numbers etc etc etc so this one's probably got a good while to run.
"Well, I still hadn't heard anything from that so I chased up Universal Credit and emailed a couple of people who's email addresses I still had from previous correspondence. On Friday, I got two emails from a guy at UC, the first said that the managed payment couldn't be processed because it wasn't on the correct form, then I got a second email minutes later to say that the managed payment had been stopped because the tenants circumstances had been changed. I've emailed the guy back to try and find out which reason it is".
Anyway, here's hoping the eviction isn't being handled as ineptly as everything else. Hopefully it's not on the grounds of non-payment of rent. Because I wouldn't think it'd be very hard to defend seeing as there's an ongoing (albeit unresolved) matter of a claim for rent assistance in progress!!
Hey, you never know. That might just be the trigger for the resolve of the claim!
Edited by Groat on Wednesday 7th July 13:02
I've been told on another forum that UC see the payment they make for rent as belonging to the tenant, and that it's entirely up to the tenant whether they agree/accept a management payment arrangement. I have no idea how true that actually is mind. If those claiming UC don't pass the rent onto the landlord, they can't be sanctioned for it. Again, no idea how true that is, it's just the response I got on a landlord forum on a thread that's since been deleted for some reason.
As for the eviction, it's being handled by Landlord Action, and they were great handling the section 8.
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