On the face of it, this case appears to be very worrying. A lot is dependent upon what correspondence you had previously received from your council. BUT... If you sent an income and expenditure breakdown to them BEFORE they engaged bailiffs then you should have been considered for an attachment order. Simply not having sufficient income is no excuse for the council to bulldoze on with bailiffs. As others have alluded to, you should now write to the council and raise the point regarding their hasty decision to use bailiffs as opposed to the more logical option of an attachment. It is very important for you to also outline your vulnerability, much of which should be already on their records. I recently endured an almost identical scenario to yours. I had to fight tooth and nail with the council over every aspect. What became clear to me is that they won't concede an inch without a fight.

Hello all need a bit of advice please.. So I have lived with 2 other lads for the past 2 years and we all agreed we would re-let our house again his year. A few weeks ago we got an email saying they needed us to confirm and sign the tenancy agreement for next year so I went down and did so expecting the others to do the same within the next couple of weeks which the Estate Agent was fine with. Then within a week or so of me signing the other 2 have had a big fallout and now they are both saying they want to move out (maybe 1 will stay if the other goes Im not sure) but as I have already signed the contract am stuck in it if they leave or? The contract is supposed to restart on the 1st of July. There's no way I can afford it on my own as Im unemployed atm so only receive JSA and Housing Benefit. Im really a bit worried.

Hi all, I'd be so grateful if anyone can offer me any advice on this, I really don't know how to proceed. It's a complicated situation so please forgive the length of the post. 3 years ago I was living in a slightly(!) dodgy houseshare, it was originally a three bedroom house which the landlord converted to four bedrooms. He never visited the property, certainly I never met him, and there was no tenancy agreement in place. Basically the rent was paid on the 25th of the month and that's all he was concerned with, he did not mind who lived there. When someone moved out they found someone to replace themselves in their room and so got their deposit back that way, there was no involvement from the landlord or even from the other housemates. This meant zero accountability, it also meant that by the time I moved out there were 9 people living there! I would never have considered moving into such an arrangement but at my previous address my tenancy was up and not renewable and in 3 months of searching I had been unable to find anywhere else at all that I could come close to affording, I had no option. I lived there for 10.5 months and moved out as soon as I got a new job that paid a bit more, in July 08. When I moved out I was up to date with the rent and I made certain that I paid my housemates my share of the outstanding bills, including council tax. Unfortunately I did this in cash so can't prove it. They were not people I kept in touch with, although I did get a single phone call from one of them in September that year as the council had been tipped off to the number of people living there (10 by then, with a single bathroom I should mention!) and were evicting them as the place was deemed unfit for habitation. I was called because no one in the house could find the landlord's telephone number. Maybe an alarm bell should have gone off in my head right then! Well, I never heard from any of the housemates, or the landlord, again after that one call. But two days ago I received a council tax bill for the property for the period 1st April 08 to 31st July 08. There are just two names on it, mine and one other girl living there at the time. I think basically this is because I was once foolish enough to email the landlord when the toilet was broken and we couldn't get him by phone, so he had my name, and the other name is the girl who called me for his number when the eviction came - also she was far and away the longest resident, she had been there already a couple of years before I lived there. On the bill she is listed as a full time student, so there is a discount given, but that still leaves a bill of £420 to be paid - presumably that means by me. The other housemates were all from Eastern European countries (mostly Estonia) and I doubt they are still in the country; I certainly have no means of tracking them down as they changed so many often and this far down the line I can't remember even the first names of the people living there at that period! I know that technically we are joint and severally liable for the council tax, but given the absence of a tenancy agreement is there a case to be made against this? Also, should I tell the council how many people were living there to support my case? I worry that in doing so I will lose the student discount given and will have even more to pay if I lose. I should also mention that there is absolutely no way I can pay this amount all at once. Like many people I am struggling to make ends meet right now and at best I could pay them perhaps £10 a month. If I tell them that are they going to laugh in my face and take me to court? Any advice at all would be greatly appreciated! Thanks.

Hi guys, I'm posting to ask for any advice people can give me. The tenancy at my old house (12 months long) has recently finished (1 month ago) and after several attempts I've contacted my landlord about claiming back my deposit. I moved out of the house after a week because of various problems, however I payed all of my rent anyway as I didnt have a choice. The landlord says that no deposits will be returned until all outstanding rent is payed, and apparently two of my fellow ex-tenants still owe rent. She suggests I give them a 'shove' to pay up. However I'm not in contact with them any more. Do I have a leg to stand on as far as claiming my £200 deposit back? Considering I didn't live there I shouldnt have wound up any fines for damages etc. I don't feel it's right that I should suffer and not receive my deposit because my old housemates didn't pay up. Do you think she may be bluffing to try and get me to get them to pay up? (basically doing her dirty work). There's no incentive for them to pay up because their deposit is less than a months rent. I know it's not a lot of money but it's the principle. Any help would be massively appreciated guys, thanks!