Hi All I need help re clarification of the above I have started a civil court action against my housing association landlord I did send a LBA They did not response They have now responded that I breached the Pre Protocol procedure re disrepair Does anyone know what this means I have already sent my N1 form plus documentations to the court thanks

Hi, I have very recently found CAG on the internet and would be happy to get some advice on a situation I am currently in with my landlord and his managing agent. I have moved to UK end of 2012 and am not very familiar with housing laws. I have an assured shorthold tenancy, starting 22 Dec 2012, ending 21 Dec 2013. I will not request renewal due to all the problems I have had here. Monthly rent to be paid to a letting agency of 1343 GBP I have had following situations of disrepair delayed repair of floor heating: 127 days, 16 Jan 2013 fixed 23 May 2013 delayed repair of front door: 72 days, 22 Jan 2013 fixed 4 April after the door became unlockable delayed repair of microwave: 120 days - outstanding unannounced entry of the property on at least 2 occasions I have requested compensation for disrepair loss of income for the emergency repair where I could not leave my home and go to work alternative heating appliance+ electricity bad health, stress, time spent etc Total amount of 1306GBP plus 70GBP court expenses The landlord and his agent refuse any responsibility. this property is new and was still under responsibility of the developer to do repairs (apart from the microwave) They offered 200GBP in compensation which I found an insult. I tried negotiating with them, but they ignored my mails. I decided to take court action after getting some free legal advice - he said it was very likely that I would get compensation - and sent a letter before action to try start up the communication/negotiation. Without succes. They did start communicating again when I started copying the letting agency and letting agency were attempting to get replies. Email communication has been very rude and intimidating, I assume to make me try and stop to get any compensation. They put all the blame with developer, and me of all people and have recently refused any negotiation of compensation. The landlord is a company with a PO box address on Isle of Man. Notices have been served - per my contract - at the letting agent. I doubt that the information of an ongoing court case has reached them. I have started a claim online, issued 18 Oct, and have requested judgement by default on 10 Nov. So far the status is "issued" Now here are some of my questions: According to the legal adviser the issues that have arisen with the developers are landlord and agent's problem and my claim lies completely with the landlord as he has the statutory obligations for repair. Is this correct? Will I be able to see online whether judgement has been granted or do I only get a notice? How long will it take to get the notice? The situation with the address, can this give any problems going forward, I am thinking if I was to enforce judgement. My last rent is due on 22 Nov. I plan to withhold this, hoping that judgement has been made by this date, would that give me problems if the landlord decides to set aside judgement and defend the case? My reasoning being that even if I get judgement, the landlord will not pay the money. I expect to get problems getting my deposit back, the landlord will probably try to blame me for breaking the microwave. Do you have any advice going forward with this? I do have on email shortly written by the agent that they do not know why it broke. Any other general advice would be very much appreciated! Apologies for the long thread, but I felt I had to give enough background information. Many thanks for any advice you can give me!

Please can someone help me with the current situation I'm having as a tenant. To summarise: 1) Our deposit is currently NOT protected. It was originally protected and held by Agent through MyDeposits scheme but the agent went bankrupt and the deposit disappeared and became unprotected. MyDeposits informed LL and us of this via letter AND I asked him via letter (and over phone) to please reprotect and give us information within the same month it happened (about a year and a half ago). He never reprotected (I have checked with all three schemes this month). 2) Reported quite serious repair issues to landlord on phone back in March. LL still hasn't fixed them to this day and didn't seem like he intended to from the start. 3) LL called up one Sunday and demanded to enter property that day to inspect (after accusing us of causing the repair damages!) - told him that it wasn't a good time that day but he showed up same night banging on our door, looking through our letterbox and demanding to come in. Eventually left after we didn't answer the door. LL showed up again announced two nights later banging on door again. I called the police this time due to harassment and he left quickly after that. 4) The next day he served us Section 21 notice through the door (even though deposit isn't protected). 5) After this we stopped paying rent due to unprotected deposit and disrepairs. Have still been trying to get him to do repairs - sent him a letter at the start of this month outlining all repair issues and asking to arrange a time to carry them out otherwise I will contact Environmental Health. He denied receiving the letter according to his new Agent so I sent it again the other day by first class mail with certificate of posting this time to both his address and his managing agent (who acknowledged receiving the letter and said would pass it on to him). 6) He served Section 8 as we are now 2 months in arrears (after I had sent the first letter) and I now have about a week to clear rent arrears before his solicitors said they would start proceedings. What I would like to know is this: 1) How do you put a counterclaim value on disrepairs? If he starts a claim against us, I will counterclaim for both disrepairs and unprotected deposit but how do you assign a value to the former? 2) Should I inform him again of my request for deposit reprotection or is it enough that I have asked him once via mail (and numerous times on the phone) and that he was informed by MyDeposits of unprotection, and should I just put it in my counterclaim with 3x deposit penalty with no further notice? Ideally I would like the deposit return + 3x penalty to offset the rent arrears, but do I have any obligation to request reprotection yet again? 3) If I put 3x deposit unprotection as part of counterclaim and then he protects it before the hearing date, am I still entitled to 3x amount? If he does protect it before hearing date but then I clear two months arrears, can he still proceed with eviction or will it be void? What I want to know basically is what the best way to act now to ensure that either my deposit is protected and the repairs are carried out (and then I will pay arrears) OR that we don't get evicted because the deposit return and penalty (and disrepair award) will offset the current arrears. If anyone can advise the best course of action, I would be very appreciative. Thanks

We started privately renting our current property Aug 2009, we noticed a musty smell in our ensuite bathroom immediately. we tried to contact landlord to no avail. We wrote to her and the letter was returned, this was late 2009. We have still not heard from her so 6 weeks ago our washing machine broke which was her property so we tried calling her again but could not get hold of her. The outsides drains were also blocked so we took action and got environmental health to track her down and get it fixed. The outside drains were fixed immediately by her 2 weeks ago, and she said she would get "her" plumber in to fix washing machine, the musty smell in the ensuite and also our gas boiler needs to be serviced because its been over 18 months since its last service. We are still trying to get her to fix these problems but still to no avail. We finally spoke to her this evening and she has tried to say that it is our responsibility to fix the washing machine, and that we should be grateful that we are paying the cheapest amount of rent in our street.........Tis made me a little mad!!!!!! We have read our contract and it states that all electrical and mechanical goods, fittings and fixtures are the landlords responsibility to maintain and repair. I see this as her breaking our tenancy agreement, and breaking the law by not have our boiler serviced because the certificate has ran out. Where do we go from here? Please HELP!!!!!!!! Tenants are always seemed to be the ones that are unfairly treated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!