I posted a long time back about getting my partners mother moved from their council house to nearer to us as she has very poor health and her friend who is her carer is 72 and they both need more support they're currently 75 miles away. Long story short after some help from an MP they have been offered a local home. They have told the council they are leaving and they now want them to sign terms and conditions saying things like they need to remove all furniture (fair enough) but they also say all carpets must be removed now the carpets that are there were down when they moved in about 24 years ago. Can the council REALLY make them remove the carpets it seems totally ridiculous to me to expect people on benefits who are having to borrow every penny from relatives to be able to afford to move house to remove carpets (stair carpet is under a stairlift anyway). The housing officer is coming tomorrow to put the thumb screws on her to sign immediately, have told her to sign nothing so need help ASAP!!!! Thanks

Sorry for the long explanation. On the 06/09/12 I lost my job. On 07/09/12 I made an online claim for JSA(C+IB) and for Housing/Council Tax Benefit. On 07/09/2012 my wife went to the Peak Valley Housing Association office to tell them I was out of work, of the above and that we will be paying rent of £250.97 on 29/09/12 to bring our rent account to a nil balance. My wife was told that any overpaid rent would be refunded once the housing benefit was awarded. Full housing and council tax benefit was awarded from W/C 10/09/12 and this created a rent credit of £239.85. We had a letter saying that we had overpaid our council tax by £143.00 and this was to be refunded to us. So my wife went to the housing office to ask how we got our overpaid rent refunded. This is where the problems start. She was told it's not that simple. First our account would have to be looked into, then referred to their finance section who would then make a decision on if we could get the money refunded. We would then have to wait for someone to send us a form to complete. My wife spoke to the same person yesterday 01/11/12 at the housing office and was told a different story. Although our account is now in credit, they will be keeping a week of the rent we had overpaid. This wasn't mentioned on 07/09/12. They accept that housing benefit is paid in arrears, but because our account was in credit they are keeping a weeks rent. Also to get any of the money back we had to request a form in writing, which we did yesterday. Can they do this? How can they keep rent for a week that Housing Benefit has been paid?:mad2: We had no problem getting the council tax refunded, all that took was one phone call to give them bank details to pay the money to.

Hi all, if you would like an insight into how these guys are thinking 1). Go to Google 2). In search enter Credit Services Association This will bring up the CSA 'segments', have a look at the segment entitled Manifesto, and read their pitch. They certainly dont like the current law or Consumer groups, if this was to enacted into law the outcome for the poor old consumer would be catastrophic!. N.B. dont go to the CSA website direct as this segment soes not show!! http://www.csa-uk.com/media/editor/file/Manifesto.pdf

Had to share this with members,you may have already seen it but the Credit Services Assn.are complaining about sites like this that give advice about how to "combat"their illegal and bullying tactics to extort money from the unsuspecting public,are they for real!!!!!!Apparently they are trying to stop us from operating or restraining what we can do???????????????Just shows that a little bit of knowledge is power and they will never prevail over decent folk who just want to be treated as human beings and not hardened criminals.Three cheers for the consumer action group,hip hip hoorah!

I live on an over 55's Shared Ownership (70%) complex which has a private car park.It is situated across from a football ground and on match days we have problems with cars blocking the car park and entrance. There used to be signs to say it was private but these were wood and have rotted away. We asked if they could be replaced and this was agreed but we have now been informed that an ANPR scheme is to be implemented which will require all authorised cars to have a permit.This is going to be a real pain for the residents, many in their eighties who rely on carers, district nurses, pharmacies etc to be able to access the car park and where the drivers are not always the same cars. The road outside the complex is double yellow lined on both sides as it is a major transport route so parking outside the complex is not an option. Elderly people need as much outside contact as possible but this is going to put friends off dropping in for a cup of tea. We have had no chance to discuss this or to agree or disagree to this happening. Is there anything we can do to stop this?

Hi all, first let me apologise if this post is in the wrong place, I wasn’t sure where to put it and this seemed like the most appropriate place at the time. Anyway, a couple of friends of mine are having some trouble with the housing association, Affinity Sutton. Background is, my friend she was married to this guy back in 2000s, in 2005 she moved out of the property she shared with him and says she informed Affinity Sutton of the move and requested she be removed from the tenancy. Shortly after leaving the property, she then moved into another property, not with the housing association, with my other friend, her new partner, and they signed a new tenancy agreement with their landlords at the time for this new place. She also began divorce proceeding in 2006 but failed to get the husband to sign anything so technically they are still married (more on this later). In 2009 Affinity Sutton contacted her, at her new address (the one she provided in 2005) telling her she was liable for the sum of £6000+ (not sure the exact figure), as the husband had not been paying as per his agreement and he had been issued with court proceeding on 2-3 occasions and now they had evicted him. Thus the outstanding owed to them was the £6K. She contacted Affinity in 2009 when she got the letter and called them and also emailed them regarding the demand. She explained she has moved in 2005 and that he was the sole tenant in the property from that date. At this time they said they would look into it and she heard nothing else. Today she has received a letter from Empress Credit Solutions telling her she owes £8,500+ in outstanding debt/rent for the property. Now she has been trying to get divorce proceedings and CSA from this guy since 2006, he runs up debt, moves and if he is found, he leaves his job and disappears again, so Affinity Sutton have obviously had trouble finding him because her own solicitor has had trouble and the CSA have found him on a couple of occasions but then he goes off radar again. Now the question is this, is she liable for this debt? If so, how so? What do we need to do to get liability removed for her, this debt is clearly not hers and she can prove she has been living elsewhere since 2005 and she also has various emails to Affinity Sutton regarding the situation. She has up to this point been very open and helpful in my opinion and it would seem they are just using her because she is an easy target. Any advice and guidance is always appreciated… mrbrooks

I note that the BPA have published their new Code of Practice on their website, It is interesting to read the maximum charge of £100 is mentioned time and time again. However, I am at a loss to understand how amounts such as this can be an accurate pre estimate of loss particularly when the Department for Transport has issed the following statement. Charges for breaking a parking contract must be reasonable and a genuine pre-estimate of loss. This means charges must compensate the landholder only for the loss they are likely to suffer because the parking contract has been broken. For example, to cover the unpaid charges and the administrative costs associated with issuing the ticket to recover the charges. Charges may not be set at higher levels than necessary to recover business losses and the intention should not be to penalise the driver. At the end of this rather long an boring document clearly designed to try and justify the existence of this questionable industry , it states that courts action or debt collectors should be used to try and recover unpaid charges. In my opinion, the above DfT statemnt combined with the recent case in S****horpe case will deter them from using the courts and of course we have been ignoring debt collectors since the Duke of Edinburgh was a boy. So is there any real change other than the long overdue clamping ban in England and Wales and the fact that the keeper/owner of the vehicle now has the opportunity to IGNORE.

Please can someone advise on the following:- On my wife's Experian statutory report which I have recently obtained there is no heading for Financial Associations within the report. It jumps from Aliases to Credit Account Information, does this mean she is not financially associated to me? I am querying this as when I look at my Equifax report I have a heading for Associations which then states underneath that I have no financial associations, therefore my presumption is that there would also be the heading available with Experian to and text stating that there are no financial associations, or am I barking up the wrong tree? If a person has no financial associations do Experian leave the heading off the statutory report altogether? Sorry for the ramble and any advise greatly appreciated.

Recently we have had a conservatory installed, but it seems we cannot insure it unless we have buildings insurance. Building insurance is held by the Housing Assocciation therefore we cannot also insure the building also as I believe it could be an offence. Recently many conservatories suffered hail damage and we do not want to be a statistic. How do we get around this one and insure only the conservatory?

Hi, I've looked for legal help on this matter and have been in touch with the MP, CAB, doctors, etc etc everyone and anyone. Here's the story: I have two children a boy being the eldest and a daughter the youngest. 11 years ago I was moved from a 3 bedroom maisonette (previously deemed unsafe for young children) to a 2 bedroom house just 5 weeks before my son turned 5 years old. Atlantic H.A. policy is two siblings of opposite sex where the eldest is 5+ years old are entitled to their own bedrooms. Craftily they moved us just before this time and 11 years later my son has just turned 16 years old and is still sharing with his sister who is due to turn 15 in March. The main reason I believe is rent arrears, due to my ex husband leaving us unexpectedly and got ourselves into a huge pile of debt. I approached the housing within a couple of weeks when I was sure he wasnt coming back and had got out of my darkest days and thay were completely unsymapthetic and threatened to kick us out there and then, even with me in tears telling them what had happened. I lost my job a while later, plunging us further into debt. I've struggled to pay this back. However, visiting the housing department of the council I was told the arrears may not make a difference at all. I know plenty of people who have moved within thios time with young children who have 'borderline problems'. They have moved on health grounds. My children are happy and healthy and I feel they have been penailsed because of this. Should they have moved us from a 3 bed in the first place? Should they have moved us out of the immediate area? This alone is causing a nightmare on finances as i've found myself without a car and have to pay someone to take them to and from school continuously. I know there is no real law against children sharing a bedroom but I do feel we have been wronged here. My son is currently sitting his exams and has a girlfriend etc etc. Both my kids went through puberty at an early age and I feel utterly awful I can't provide them with a basic suitable home. We were told one could sleep in the living room but the house is tiny and we are tripping over each other as it is. Any help would be greatly received.