Hi My wife was seriously assaulted at her work 2.5 years ago. After a huge amount of hassle, delays, and mis-handling of information, she was eventually awarded £1000. Initially, the claim had been rejected due to lack of a Police report - which had already been provided - and we had to appeal that. My wife suffered soft tissue damage to her wrist, a patient had violently grabbed her, pinned her down on a desk, and held her there for quite a while before being subdued. She was off work for 6 months, suffered PTSD as a result of the assault and attended several physiotherapy sessions, and now has developed what is being queried as Carpal Tunnel Syndrome which a specialist believes to be linked to the assault. We believe that very little has been taken into consideration when they (rather reluctantly it would seem) made the award, especially the PTSD, and now she has resigned due to her employer not making any attempt to accommodate her in a lighter role as her current position causes a great deal of pain and discomfort and essentially unable to carry out her duties. We are seriously considering appealing this and would appreciate any advice.

Thanks for your reply. As tempting as that is to do, we no longer have the keys and given the nature of the reason we had to leave believe me we are fearful of going near the house so unfortunately it's a no-go. I'm not looking to simply get out of paying for it, I was just curious as to if it is part of the fixtures and fittings of the house, would that not be included in the sale?

Can anyone please advise? Would greatly appreciate if they could.

Hi We took a year's tenancy agreement with a private landlord in July this year. Initially the landlord seemed a very nice man, things were going well until about 2 weeks ago the power to the flat completely failed at about 8pm at night. I called the power supplier who stated it wasn't their issue as the power to the flat was fine. Upon calling the landlord, despite having a young son, he flatly refused to have an emergency electrician come out to the flat and left us with no heating or power overnight (all-electric flat). The next morning his appointed electrician claimed to have attempted access to the flat (it's through a secure door entry downstairs) but he did not attempt to use this at all - all the electrician did was to call my mobile three times (phone completely flat due to no power!) and this over an hour later than he was supposed to have arrived (0845 appointment time, called at 0947). I called the landlord who blamed me saying I should have ensured he had entry, needless to say I wasn't best chuffed with him at that. He eventually got another electrician to appear at almost 5pm, he looked at the issue and determined that a completely new panel was required but that he couldn't obtain one for almost 24 hours. For a second night we were left without any power whatsoever, again had to go out to eat, and then come home to a freezing flat with no lighting or heat. It was around 5pm on the Wednesday the power was eventually restored. By this time we had lost all the contents of our fridge/freezer, and had to pay for eating elsewhere. His reply to my concern was a very harsh three-worded text message "claim your insurance". The insurance company would only cover the freezer contents, nothing in the fridge or our other expenses and by the time the excess is deducted it's almost pointless to claim. Even if it were just my wife and I in the flat it's unreasonable to expect anyone to sit without power of any sort for almost 2 days, but given we also have our daughter and a very young son at home it beggars belief in my opinion. I would appreciate any advice anyone could give me on this. Many thanks.

Hi We were quite literally forced form our home of almost 10 years by violent, aggressive neighbours who made our life such an absolute misery both my wife and I were off work with stress for long periods of time, my daughter and my son suffered health problems, and we were left with no alternative but to voluntarily surrender our keys back to HBOS in July. It was a concerted effort by 4 families, 2 who had family members arrested for threatening behaviour, and we are now left with picking up the pieces. Some 3 months later we still have not heard from HBOS and are receiving through threatening mail from Solicitors representing them. We are now in private rented accommodation which is far from ideal, especially with a clown of a landlord though that's another post in another forum............. The house we left remains unsold and from the looks of things hasn't had anyone near it since we left which I thought quite strange. I'm worried they leave it so long to attempt to sell it we are then left with a huge shortfall to meet (when we left there was equity left which had the house sold for even a bit less than the market value it would all have been covered. The longer this takes the less likely this will be. The other issue is that we purchased a new boiler and had this installed in March. I know that we are liable for the loan taken to purchase this, however, it really does rankle me that we have this loan for the next few years for something that we will never be able to use and someone else will have a lovely, shiny new boiler! What I would say is that please don't anyone come on and give me a "tough" story or the likes, if simply there is no way out of having to pay this loan then fine it's a damn hard lesson to take. However, as I'm sure some will appreciate, there's absolutely no way we'd have replaced the boiler if we were about to be forced from our home. The boiler in the property at that point, although not new, wasn't about to pack in either and was regularly maintained.

Thanks. The problem isn't even with next door really, it's this guys' father who insists on complaining and trying to tell us what to do and he lives 100 yards away! He's the real problem not our neighbours which complicates things I think.

He's completely unreasonable and every discussion with him is absolutely pointless, he refuses to listen. I guess we speak to a lawyer?

Hi Both ourselves and our neighbours have bought their houses. We had Sky out to fix the dish on the chimney recently and our next-door neighbour's father, who lives 100 yards down the road, suddenly appeared and was aggressive and obstructive when the Engineers were attempting to do their job. It's not the first time this father has caused hassle, he's been aggressive and threatening before. His son really isn't any problem but for some reason his father seems to think he can object to anything we seem to do even like parking on the communal space by the road. Is there anything we can do to stop this guy hassling us?

Ok thanks, is there a template letter I could use for this, want to word it properly. Felt really threatened when I was in there, and whilst they probably wouldn't have done anything you just had this seriously uncomfortable feeling the whole time I was there.

I've tried a few times, unfortunately it seems to just retain the original settings. Sorry about that.

I purchased a car from a Used Car Dealer in Glasgow at the end of March. It was paid for by debit card, full cost up front (£695). The seller claimed to be "just working there that day filling in", turns out he works there all the time sourcing cars for them. As soon as I drove it I noticed the spedometer didn't work, neither did the odometer, and pointed this out - I was told to bring it back the next day as they could do nothing about it and it would be "okay to drive, just judge your speed by the rest of the cars on the road"!! As I drove home (about 20 miles away) the car began to completely lose power almost every time I dropped gears. I called them the next day, strangely no-one available but I left a message to say I'd be bringing the car back and wanted a refund. I duly did, only to be met by the "official salesman" telling me he couldn't do anything as the person who sold it would have to authorise the refund and wouldn't be back for another 5 hours.I went to the local Police station for advice, they agreed that whilst they couldn't intervene they said it dangerous to drive a car without a working spedometer or odometer (to me that's fraudulant to sell a car which doesn't record mileage) and that it breached the sale of goods act by selling a car with such defaults (even though it wouldnt' fail an MOT). Armed with this, I went back and low and behold the guy who wouldnt' be back for 5 hours and only was filling in had suddenly turned up, as had another 3 guys and each chipped in with their own sarcastic, heavily-toned comments. After much arguing I eventually got back £545, but they refused to give me back the remaining £150 claiming it was a "non-refundable deposit", none of which was advised to me at any time. The seller then began to become agressive in tone, saying I would get nothing back and I'd be more than welcome to go to Trading Standards and that they'd "laugh themselves silly at me". The car was clearly not fit for purpose, and irrespective of it costing less than £700, it's not unreasonable to expect to know how fast you are going and how far you've gone, or for the car to be reliable enough to retain power when you brake? I have contacted Trading Standards who unfotunately haven't been much help, telling me to write to this company, though I know this would be pointless. Can anyone please advise me what is best to do, I can ill-afford to lose the £150?

Just heard about this... CAMPAIGNERS have condemned a price rise on mobile phone contracts worth an estimated £52 million from telecommunications giant EE. • EE price rise condemned by consumer campaigners • 3.3 per cent hike criticised as users will potentially see prices go up mid-contract Everything Everywhere announced the 3.3 per cent rise on Orange and T-Mobile contracts to take place on April 10 and May 9 respectively. Consumer watchdog Which? said it was a natural assumption by customers that a “fixed term” contract also meant fixed prices. Which? executive director Richard Lloyd said: “It is outrageous that Everything Everywhere is forcing T-Mobile and Orange customers to collectively pay almost £52 million more per year for mobile phone contracts they thought were fixed.” But EE insisted that contracts subject to the rise for 3G customers was never fixed price. They added that they were now introducing fixed-price contracts. A spokeswoman for Ofcom said: “Ofcom is aware of the pricing changes announced by EE. While current rules allow for contracts to include price increases in certain circumstances, Ofcom is consulting on how to better protect consumers from price rises during fixed contracts. Ofcom is currently running a consultation on mid-contract price rises and expects to reach a decision in June. Was wondering how this affects my current 24-month contract (currently 9 months in) and whether or not I can claim breach of contract?

Says in the letter "as your account is now managed by Debt Managers". I imagine this to mean that Shop Direct no longer own the account. Should I therefore phone them and demand the money is sent to us instead?

Had a PPI claim against this lot (was an Additions catalog account) and they've written back now with a final answer. It's been found in our favour, however, as the account had gone to Debt Managers 3 years ago (effectively closing the account I'd have thought), they are sending more or less all of it to them to settle the account. Now, is this right, can they do that or should they not be sending it all to us firstly to decide what to do with it? Would appreciate advice please. Edit - should be Shop Direct - sorry!

Got a letter yesterday to say Picture Home Loans have had liquidators appointed (Deloitte and Touche). It went on to say they believe Picture have no funds to pay compensation for any claims against them now. Wondering what that all means now.