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Johnny1978

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  1. Hi and thank you all guys. don't have much time cos at work, but we are doing a midnight flit tonight, its got worse. She basically brought a bloke in on monday to look at the house and gave him keys. i asked her who he was and she responded ' i don't know, but i'll find out when he comes wont i?' she took him on a tour of the house and then handed him keys. We only know cos we are listening in. i saw him from the window - a burly 40 odd bloke with a shaven head and tattoos - hardly an appropriate housemate for two women. i was very upset that we were not even consulted about this (other two tenants knew nothing about his moving in). next day we were listening in and he came back for the room keys - moving in on wednesday!!!! i heard her ask his last name - she clearly didnt know. no references were taken - he could be anybody. we casually went downstairs to investigate and i pretended that i didnt know who he was until i formally introiduced. my LL was putting her nicey nice act on. i was just fuming. she was wanting me to do the whole hard sell about how great the house was. she was hinting for me to say he could use my net and my kitchen stuff. but underneath i was seething. my other housemate was scared too - saying who was he? where were his references?? he could bring groups of friends to the house etc. we arranged a meeting all three of us with her. she turned up but this third woman did not and we wanted to speak to her all together. we briefly said well, theres no heat and we want it. i said i'm a little cold, but other h/m is very cold. my ll laughed and said "well i'm not cold!' and her words were ' if X wants heating on a lot then she'll have to pay for it.. ' she then went **** ing and moaning to her son downstairs. this woman has been in our home EVERY SINGLE DAY when ive come back from work - saturday to thursday. then the sh*?* hit the fan... i got in and she was there. She called me and had an aggressive "CHAT" with me, basically this bloody third housemate had clearly seen her before and shed given her stick about wanting the heating on. our other housemate had defended herself by dropping me in it by deflecting it to: SHE says blah blah blah. ...." My landlady was subtly threatening - i could see she was seething underneath. she said 'for your information my tenants are hand picked - this guy is a friend of a friend of a friend.." she accused me of being rude when this guy came, ignorant, " i turned my back" and then started going "oh, i WON'T say it...it's just that you're... no actually i won't say it...." i said "well say what?" i was very calm and also a bit upset at being spoken to in this threatening way and felt like at any moment she would flip. She said "well, maybe theres something here you don't like.. or maybe its ME you don't like.. .. and if you don't like me or my pratices you know what you can do.. if you've got some sort of problem.. ive been letting houses out for 5 years i'm experienced.. .' then she started saying i was slagging her behind her back about this guy and the heating .. (well i was, but i think anybody could see why) i reasonably replied with a) i didnt know WHO this guy was, you never told us, let us meet him, consulted us.. you just moved him in, so how am i supposed to guess who this bloke is stood in the kitchen?' she had nothing to say to that save for "well yes but are YOU telling me how i rent my own house out??? are you telling me what i can and cant do with my own property???|" I felt very threatened by her. I THEN discovered she told the other housemate who complained that the heating should be on that if she wanted it, she had to pay an EXTRA £30 - FROM THAT DAY! added onto her rent!!!! she then wrote a NEWSLETTER! Some really nicey nicey letter designed to excuse all of her behaviour in a nicey way "just popping into help you clean" " no contracts or deposits because i work on trust!!" "making improvements to the house!" she referred to it as a "happy and honest home!" Then made sarcastic comments about me in the day to my friend ('oh i'm moving this table -maybe she wants a meeting about it first and thinks she should be informed!!!) and other housemate, and then was at home when i came back. a strange man was using the shower. one of her "clients". and this was the final straw. we arranged to do a midnight flit. i went to work the next day and my friend text me saying "shes in your room. i can hear her walking around and then she shut the door". he can hear because its the room next to his and theres a wood floor. Where do stand legally though we are vacating the property asap - we owe no rent - rent due today. we're vacating with no notice and hoping she doesnt catch us and posting keys back. We are worried - my friend and other housemate works for the police, and i am a student teacher. we cant afford to have any CRB issues. and we know she will flip if we say were leaving or if she catches us. very worried.
  2. oh also, btw, is her locking the boiler illegal too? We can't imagine that it's in any way right as nobody has any access to it now.
  3. Thank you all. I now have some ideas about what she ias exactly doing that's illegal. Rather than comeuppance, per se, in terms of revenge, like you say - it's exploiting vulnerable people and that's what makes me really angry - my housemates are in a foreign country/unemployed/students etc. My concern is that even if we move, as two employed english people we are in a much stronger position and still get this treatment, so i shudder to think what she would do if she had a house full of more vulnerable people. We are trying to get out asap, but we like the people we live with and feel that they are being used to: for example as regards this council tax bill - the guy didn't realise that once a bill is in your name, that's it! they will still pursue him for it even if he moves elsewhere. he was worried sick as the bill was about £2,000 and then they sent him one for a final demand. This is the kind of exploitation i'm talking about and i feel that standing by letting it go on when we know its wrong is bad too. x
  4. Hi everyone. I believe I am a tenant of the worst landlady in the UK. The effect of her behaviour on myself and my housemate is actually tangible. We have never been so stressed out. our home is a source of stress and anxiety. This woman clearly has some sort of disordered mind or personality and we are at the whim of it. We moved in three months ago. At the time, she knew my mother and told my mother that she would be renting out her house, as she was moving around the corner. We agreed to move in - this woman at the start was very nice, doing the whole "as its you", theres no need for contracts or deposits i knew you when you were a baby!! etc. Myself and a friend moved in, and there was an existing tenant who is eastern european. She and her son and his partner were already living here and were "going to move". the move dragged on. We were given a set rent of £110 a week for my two rooms. and my friend pays £80 pw. I paid rent for a week on two rooms when her son was living in one of them. i was very angry about this, but kept quiet. It has only got worse. She told us she had a business registered against this address so might 'pop in' a couple of times a week. We felt this reasonable enough. This has descended quickly into not only every day, but invariably at least THREE times a day. She has been here three times already today. This woman lets herself in and starts acting like its still her home, and worse. she strides in at all hours - the other night she was here at 11pm on a wednesday night. In addition to this her son and his partner have keys. They let themselves in on a whim too. The excuses for entering the property in this way vary from they're "still moving stuff" to " she's helping us" by scrubbing the floors, she's "picking up post" or her son is working on the house and "shes cooking a meal". Worse, this business appears not to be a "beauty service" as was suggested- its some sort of massage/waxing thing. Her other business we have ascertained is a gay sauna. Men and women knock at the door or enter the house for "treatments". once, a transvestite came in (yeah, we laughed too..) for a "wax". Then she told us her "beauty clients" use our bathroom, because they need showers and stuff. What?? This is in our home. Then, she moved in some other woman - we were not consulted - so we have four living here. She basically told this woman that she was "in charge" of us. This woman started off making our lives a misery, but since has come round to the fact that there is something dodgy. She is the most money grabbing bitch i have ever met. My rent was at one stage £433.34p a month. Seriously. then things got worse... Our rent is "all inclusive". one unemployed guy lives here, one employed (me), a self employed person, and another student. The eastern european (unemployed) came home one day saying he was worried about a letter (this man is very benign and very mousey, and obviously rather vulnerable living in a foreign country) that was in his name. He knew nothing about it. It was a council tax bill in his name for this property, and written on it was my landladys name, phone number and "my partner". This lad had no idea why it has come. i asked him who had written on it, and he said my landlady. She told him to go to the council tax people and show them this letter. We very quickly pieced together what had happened. She was trying to defraud council tax by claiming that they were partners and possibly something to do with council tax benefit too. we suspect the other property was involved as my ll had told this lad that "council tax can only be in one persons name, per property - it cant be in hers for this house and her other house". Worse still - our rent is "All inclusive of council tax" - me and my friend are charged for it. She clearly is lying and saying that this unemployed guy is sole occupant and simply pocketing the money. This eastern european lad told me a few home truths about her. he turned the bath on once and said she flipped and threw him out onto the street and said "get the f**k out of my house". he said she has slung others out onto the street too. He told me he found cannabis in the house once. it was hers. We feel very vulnerable as we are currently saving for somewhere to go behind her back. She told us once that her past tenants have "urinated on her floor, and keyed her car and smashed her windows". We see why now. I am due to return to university soon. I asked her about a council tax reduction and she said "its all inclusive". this is her only answer. When i claim something is too expensive, she either tells me this, or "its because of the accountant". I took one room upstairs, as i could no longer afford two. At this point, she told us that there would be a "winter rate" on rent. She had alluded to this when we moved in, saying £10 extra was reasonable. I agreed it was. S he clearly meant £10 a week though. Working this out at £44 a month extra for me and my friend, so £88, and probably another £44 for another tenant. this is to cover "extra heating". ha! Then she tried to make me pay it early, but i had a housemate who witnessed this "winter rate" discussion, and who said "no you said from september not august..." She backed down, but the spiteful bitch then said "Ah. Well ok. But the winter rate is carrying on throughout the year too now into the summer, because i need to cover my gas bills...." There is no internet here either - i pay my own, i am council tax exempt, and there is no phone. There is no living room too - she fills this 4 bedroom house up with tenants.(or "lodgers" as she calls them) She is renting out the two rooms to two others - god knows who- so SIX people in this house, plus her and her sons... then WORSE still, this week, i have been pushed to the limit. I returned home as usual to find everything had been moved around . She touches all my stuff. I found my coats, shoes, and bags, had gone from the cupboard under the stairs and the hooks on the hall. I am moving upstairs ATM. I found my things dumped outside my room on the floor, with my hairdryers from under the sink. she pushed a note under the door saying she was "helping me move". Its ANOTHER example of the controlling nature. its almost abusive. We are watched constantly, passively aggressively prodded to do this or that. she makes snide comments. Then, i went downstairs. She had put a PADLOCKED cupboard fitted on the boiler so that people couldnt touch the heating or hot water settings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i flipped out. She has been here three times today prodding me to do this that. Wanting me to do this or that. if i dont do what she "suggests" within 24 hours she will be back, prodding me. we all hate this woman. we are convinced she is dodgy and exploitative. We wish her nothing but the very worst. These are just a few examples of what she does to grab money and exploit people. We want to move ASAP, but equally we want to give her her comeuppance, but as she is threatening and clearly knows dodgy people, we want her not to know it was us. She is a millionaire. this money comes from exploiting vulnerable people. Even if we move out, which we will soon, she will simply carry on doing it to others. What can we do?
  5. Hi, now i have more time! Thanks for the links - I'll read them in a bit. I went to work this morning - the front door was open. i came home - the back door is propped open. i shut it. At ten pm now - it was open. Now, all the piles of post have disappeared! As far as i am concerned, i signed up for a flat with two external doors - not two that are permanently propped open. Also, there was a lot of post in the vestibule - bank statements, final bills, previous tenants stuff- now its all gone except for one or two letters!!! Again, i would NEVER have lived here if i knew what was going on. Somebody is up to something here, i know it. it's things like this that i didn't sign up for. i think i have the right to want out. i spoke to my agents who said they will discuss the matter with their bosses, i.e how to stop it and if i can get out of my contract and let them re-advertise. but i hate living here - i'm constantly on edge. last night i heard somebody walking about and opening the doors again. i have a right to feel safe in my own home - i have paid my agents £1000 to feel like this. I just hope they let me out of the contract....
  6. Hello, really quick because i'm at work and shouldn't be on here but am very worried... Basically, i signed a tenanct agreement AST, two weeks ago for a ground floor victorian flat. Many promises were made to me about the flat (heating woukld be fixed, etc) that did not materialise. water is leaking under my sink under electrical sockets, the buzzer does not work, etc.. however - the main thing is that i feel scared to be alone there at night. my neighbours (different landlords) leave the front and back doors open all the time. this terrifies me, and i want out -how?
  7. Hi, well i'm with CCCS, but they can't deal with my renewed budget because my circumstances are about to change (new job and moving in 2 weeks) Crapquest have taken advantage of this by saying that as ccs will not confirm they have details of my income, by hassling me. i was supposed to pay a settlement figure of £300, but when it came down to it, i offered them 200 as i didnt have the money. They then rang me up asking me why i no longer had the money and what I DID with it! I was fuming. i told them i was on a DMP (CCS are still paying them £10 a month, but they are trying to bully me into a settlement figure.) i told them i was dealing with ccss and they let it go for a week. Then this letter arrived. They have just called, telling my housemate that they are DM company, asking for where i am, my mobile, and when i will be back!! How dare they disclose that? She knows anyway, but what if i didn't want her to know, or they called my work? I just want to pay them because I'm sick of the stress. No doubt when i move i'll have it there too!
  8. Hi, They have just done the exact same thing to me- threatened me with people who are not bailiffs, but who certainly sound like them. Who will be visiting my home. mine is over a capital one debt- i've paid £200 this month and they wanted the rest of the settlement (£233) but i just cannot afford it as i don't start my new job until next week. i know this is illegal, but i'm still worried because these guys are unlawful jokers. My letter says too: 'the doorstep agent is instructed to collect the full amount due and to compile a report to assist in possible further action.' to avoid a visit, they want me to contact them by 28 august, to discuss my account, and they want 3 monthly instalments to clear it. I probably will do this because I am sick of this **** company bothering me. Despite your letters, two years on they are still doing this.
  9. Ah- see, a week ago i was asked if i'd ever had a CCJ i thought, no! Then afterwards thought..hang on... what was that? Given all this, do you think that the council served a liability order on me then? Is this, in credit terms, as bad as a ccj? When will it expire? Thank you!
  10. Hi there, I'm quite worried that I've had a CCJ, but can't be sure. This sounds ridiculous, granted, but it happened over my council tax in 2004. I split with my partner, registered for council tax, but no letter arrived. The council said they'd sent it- they hadn't. i wrote letters, emails and chased them, but found out later that they had been billing ME for MY council tax at my partners address! They carried on doing it and it was quite an acrimonious split from my partner and he was not passing on my mail. I was only 20 at the time, and when I left the house, thinking no more of it and moved back to my parents for uni, one day a bailiff turned up at my house demanding £800 of council tax. I was so scared that i paid this out of my student loan! Now, i look back and think, hang on- can a bailiff come to your house WITHOUT a CCJ? I'm awaiting my credit report, but i'm worried about this. I never saw ANY paperwork from the council, so would never know what had happened! Does this sound to you like a CCJ, or can a council order bailiffs from a DCA? x
  11. stan- i am with you- ive had an account with them since june- ive NEVER been able to log in, ive ended up using about 6 different passcodes- apparently they are somehow "linked" so that if you forget one, you have to re-order the other. Then the new one comes. this is somehow not linked to my old one.. i order another, it doesnt work.. they suspect fraud on my account ive tried to log in so many times. they use a long number with means nothing to you, a membership number which means nothing, then some crappy "memorable word" then, you get locked out. ive never had this problem with halifax or lloyds, its this crappy site, its the worst ever!!
  12. Hi Alun, I'm very sorry to hear of your problems with Lloyds T(he) S(h**) B(ank). What makes my blood boil about Lloyds is how they pick on the vulnerable. Most people I hear about who have these problems with huge charges or threats with lloyds are single parents, students, ill, on benefits, made redundant or on low incomes. They are appalling. If somebody offered me a job working for that organisation tomorrow on 50k, i'd turn it down, because I wouldn't be able to live with my own conscience. How anybody works for them, and actually executes these kind of policies and this behaviour is beyond me. I have posted a thread about them too and their ludicrous charges that are nothing short of wickedness. £190 for 4 days overdrawn! I tried to claim back under hardship but they, as you say, sent letters that were almost written by a computer. I think most of lloyds staff are computers. I mean cyborgs have no emotions, right? Myself and other friends have been subject to their bully boy tactics.My friend was getting threatening letters over her o/d. their answer? give her a credit card from them or threaten to remove her o/d facility and swallow her wages. this tactic was used on me too- 3 days before my student loan was due to be paid in- they told me if i did not agree to £50 a month repayments, they would take my loan. I'm not as stupid as that now, but at the time i was 21 and was terrified of the bullying used by their call centres. my friend Em is a mother of 2 who was taken into hospital- in the week she was in she went o/d- she ended up with nearly £800 charges. All they told her was that she was "unable to manage her account". For manage, read " pull money out of the ether". l know what you're going through with their tactics and ludicrous charges, i was suddenly put in debt collections when i returned to university. Nobody in branch would touch me with a barge pole, and like you i was told to call a call centre in a side room. Thats all theyd do for me. If you read my thread i posted here, at the 11th hour i've been hit with charges i now cannot afford. Again- unauthorised o/d. The final insult was that i caught sight of my profile once on their computer- it listed me as a "low risk" borrower. I've been treated like a crim for years by them. I could write a book about lloyds disgusting tactics, but i agree with the previous poster- don't tell them about your heath problems- who the hell are they to have any right to ask? The thing with lloyds is, any protests are simply used as more rope to hang you with. they love to find a vulnerability or a weakness. My uncle was made redundant and like a fool, told them so, expecting leniency, but simply got jumped on and was forced to admit that he was therefore declaring himself insolvent and used this information to pass his account onto a debt collection agency. same with me- all i did was go in to apply for a student account- next thing i was told i'd be put into collections as they took that as "declaring i was no longer employed full time" These people are simply call centre monkeys, they have no right to personal information about you and no right to threaten you. Please don't worry about bailiffs, lloyds have a lot of fancy names, including so called " solicitors" who are basically people in call centres pretending to act as solicitors. it's all bully boy tactics. I'm sure i read somewhere too that money should not be taken from benefits to pay debtors with. I'd advise you to go to CCCS, but- i did and lloyds simply ignored the £5 arrangement and continued to take what they wanted from my account. They are nothing but ****, and please remember that in your dealings with them. good on you for standing up to them and letting them know they can't push you around. I wish you all the very best and lloyds nothing but the very worst! x
  13. Hi there, I had an overdraft with lloyds tsb 4 years ago that stood at 2k. They put me in collections when i was a student and I've worked really hard to get it down to the £90 it was two weeks ago. They sent me a letter telling me my o/d would be taken away, and i thought that a cheque would clear and i'd be able to pay it off. However, come friday my account still wasnt in credit and i now had an unauthorised o/d. By the time i credited and attempted to close my account on tuesday morning i was told that I owed £190 in charges because of those 4 days. :-o I nearly hit the deck. I am unemployed right now and on benefits and i wanted to close the damn account and get things paid off- now i'm going to be hit with these charges in december. i can only just afford to make this payment and it leaves me very short. whats more i am due to start nursing training soon, so i shant have much money to spare in the coming months either. The guy in my branch was very sympathetic and agreed off the record that these charges were beyond the pale and spiteful- £190 in charges for a £90 o/d? He said if it were up to him, he'd write them off, but he didnt have the power to do so. He suggested I write a letter telling them i couldn't afford to pay and to ask them to waive the charges. He told me my situation was ridiculous and to really ensure I did. he said he wasn't hopeful they would, but told me to give it a go nevertheless. I was wondering, what do you think my chances are, and are there any such templates out there that i could base my letter on, as i have no idea how to word the letter or what tone to use. Thanks!
  14. catlover64- i have posted a thread here in this forum, describing us moving into a house LEFT in a similar state. as a tenant that is having to undo all of the work left by similar previous tenants i can understand exactly where you are coming from and costs and time of cleaning up after people like this. I also know the costs of removing rubbish- not cheap. I think what you outlined in your original post was perfectly reasonable as leaving things like grease and chip fat on the walls of a property is totally unacceptable. I can imagine the state of your property as we have the same problems here. It really is beyond the pale. Whats worse is the fact that its not even your dirt! yuk! jeez! good luck!
  15. hi there, 4 weeks ago we moved into a rented property (we have a rolling monthly contract). We knew the house was in a pretty bad state of disrepair, but as we only had a short while to view, the true horror was not apparent until we moved in. What i thought was a yellow wall, was in fact once white and is nicotine yellowed. there is fat (??) grease and dirt in in all woodwork. mould in the kitchen, behind the washer. The dark green carpet in the middle room, was in fact damp underneath and rotten. the landlord seems to do minimal repairs and we are the ones in the tenancy contract responsible for "all internal decoration matters". So basically it is up to us to repaint the entire house, fit carpets in 3 rooms and we have already bought tiles for the kitchen and bathroom. We have had to pay the council to dispose of rubbish left by previous tenants. We are also responsible for all glass in the windows, which seemed reasonable until we were told that next doors windows FELL IN and they were expected to foot the bill (same landlord). to top this off, we have been told by our builder that the previous tenants were growing weed in the front bedroom- explaining the holes in the ceiling and the walls and in the fireplace and the tin foil stuck to the walls. As you can imagine, as time has gone on, we are finding more and more wrong with this house. each job we undertake (pulling up a carpet, stripping the filthy wallpaper) opens up a whole new set of problems. We are not merely decorating this house we are renovating it. At the moment, the hallways walls are half painted, we have repainted two rooms, the bathroom is half done and we have pulled up the vile carpets, leaving bare floors. My partner has stripped all of the mouldy/greasy/rotting paint from the kitchen and now the walls are bare. We have had a discussion and totalled up spent costs combined with costs to come of making this house acceptable will be 1500. We now want to move out but i'm worried that they will withold our deposit as we have done half a job. All i would say in our defence is better no carpets than smelly rotten ones that are filthy, and better no paint and bare plaster than mould and chip fat. I have also done the garden and redecorated the front room. Do you think they will withold our deposit for this? I don't see why i should have to pay for basic things to line our landlords pocket. Next door are putting in new carpets and floors too and worktops, but i really am sick of it. we have been here 4 weeks and still have no useable kitchen. Where do we stand legally?
  16. Hi, thanks for your replies. yes we have both moved our accounts elsewhere and are doing as CCCS say, but it is worrying us somewhat. We sent our letters outlining our circumstances and listing all the charges. Lloyds seem to agree verbally that we are in hardship on the phone, (both now out of work and on DMP) but formally take no action. This £1000 they owe us each would help us out enormously, but instead they keep charging us. I'm terrified of these charges amassing into a big bill. We are wondering what we should do now and how we do it? Court or FO?
  17. Hi there, this is my first post so apologies if this is in the wrong place. We are having problems with lloyds (as per usual..*sigh*) I am on a DMP with CCCS. I set it up in june. All of my creditors are accepting the plan, except for lloyds. I am in collections with them, over originally a 1700 o/d which i have got down to just £150. They put me into debt collections when i told them i was going to uni, then forced me to repay or they said they would take my student loan. This repayment came in the form of them dipping into my account every month, unstatemented, and taking anything from £50, to £15. its now £15. they have not acknowledged the DMP from cccs, as i rang up CCCS and they said they had no acknowledgement from them. CCCS told me them dipping into my bank account was outrageous and to open a new account and just pay them £5 a month as arranged via CCCS. But today they took out that £15 (£3 of that is "interest") then took £3 o/d interest. erm, interest twice?? Then they are getting my CCCS £5 too. as a result ive now been charged £15, plus £15 o/d fee. I have obviously had to pay this money back into my account to stop myself incurring more charges. We are really in serious trouble financially and cannot afford these charges, especially not over a £150 o/d. CCCS said that sometimes, they don't acknowledge the repayment or they may be slow. So i'll have to wait and see, but i really am sick of lloyds and i was wondering if anybody else has been in this position before? My branch won't talk to me as i am in collections. and collections are only interested in getting as much money as they can out of you so will not listen to negotiation. I'm worried if i don't pay them this money, then they will simply keep taking it and pushing me overdrawn. Our second problem with lloyds is this. OH and i have started hardship bank charges claims. Both sent off the first letter. They owe us about £1000 each in payments. My OH was made redundant and they rang up to "check" if he was in financial difficulty. the woman had to concede that yes we were. I got no such phonecall, only an insulting letter that showed that they hadnt even LOOKED at my case- insultingly suggesting that i "may well" be in financial difficulty, (i'm on a CCCS plan) and why don't i contact their collections department if i cant repay? (erm, i'm already WITH collections) then full of crap like "our service is a fair one and our charges reflect the value customers put on our service" which was insulting enough to make me want to vomit. The upshot of the letter was that they basically havent looked at our case, don't care and until theyre found guilty, they say they arent obliged to help us. We definitely want to take it higher as lloyds have caused us nothing but trouble for years, but what should our next step be? the ombudsman? We really are in such trouble with money to the point where OH has had to default on his loan for the first time ever, and we will have the fallout of that next month to deal with. Where do we go from here with lloyds? Any help would be gratefully appreciated!
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