Good Afternoon All. I was really looking for some advice on way's I can move forward with the following situation: My partner, son and I live in a housing association property and pay £870 per month for a 2 bedroom house. As of February 2013 I had to change jobs due to my previous company making redundancies and jumped into the next suitable job for financial security purposes etc. I went from a 30k a year salary to 23k per year and my partner takes home roughly £650 per month as she works part-time due to being the primary carer for our son. Unfortunately as we both have bad poor credit scores we need to use payday loans to help us get throught the month but now are in a situation where we are taking them out to help with living and the cost of rent! Each month we are needing to pay back the previous loan and take out another one and the amount with interest has gradually increased as we have needed slightly more each month as we are loosing a lot of money in interest. The problem we have now is that the maximum loan I can take out just about covers the rent but we'll have nothing else to live off of for the month. I'm not too sure what to do with this one, I don't want to get into rent arrears or have a payday loan we can't pay back, especially as I can't imagine them being that flexible. Is there any support or advice out there to help manage housing association rental arrears as I don't see any other solution to get us through the month then to pay less on the rent? Unfortunatly there isn't anyone we could ask to burrow the money from. Thank you for your time.

I'm looking for some advice on what my options may be (if any!) in the following situation.... I am a tenant of Peabody Housing Association and I have an allocated parking space on my estate. I pay rent for this space direct to Peabody by direct debit. Peabody have contracted MET Parking services to administer the parking controls on my estate and residents apply to MET for our parking permits. In June I received a Parking Charge Notice from MET Parking for £60 for parking without having a valid permit (my permit had expired). I appealed against the charge using their online appeal form on 25 June (1 day after the ticket was issued). Unfortunately for me, I then forgot all about the ticket, and I received no correspondence from MET Parking at all. Then yesterday (13 Nov) I received a letter from Debt Recovery Plus demanding £150 for the unpaid parking charge, saying that MET Parking had referred the matter to them as the original charge had not been paid. I have phoned both DRP and MET, both of whom have been extremely unhelpful. MET claim that 3 letters were sent to me, telling me that my appeal was unsuccessful and the charge needed to be paid; however I have not received any of them. Apparently I am now unable to pay the initial £60 charge as the deadline has passed, and I also missed out on the opportunity to appeal to POPLA as this information was also in the missing letters and that deadline has also passed. I don't generally have a problem with my post so I feel it's extremely unlikely that 3 letters have been lost in transit, but MET say that they can prove they've been posted. DRP say that I have 10 days to pay the £150 or they will take me to court. They did offer me a 20% reduction but that's still £120 which I really feel I should not have to pay. At this point I would be willing to pay the £60 even though I think it is excessive - I was still paying for using the parking space even when my permit had expired, so there was no loss of revenue to Peabody (unfortunately I've only just learnt of gpeol (via this website) so didn't use that in my original appeal!). My real concern is that they actually will take me to court and I'll be faced with a bigger bill to pay, but I also really don't want to pay £150 when I haven't received the information that I should have done which would have allowed me to pay the original charge or appeal again. I don't know what my best course of action is. It seems like all the relevant deadlines for appeal have passed, so am I able to appeal to anyone, and if so who? Any advice gratefully received.

I have a problem with my housing association and I don't know quite where to turn. So I am posting here.I live in a small block of flats run by my housing association,also known as housing trust. I live on the ground floor and there are two flats on the ground floor,my flat and my next door neighbors. My situation is this,for the past 2 weeks now,we have had no light on the ground floor in the communal hall in our block because my housing association won't fix it. I telephoned my housing association customer services or repairs department as it is called on 17th June. I reported the repair to them. My HA told me that they would send an electrician round to fix the light. But they did not send anyone round and the repair and I have been phoning them every day for the past 2 weeks telling them that I and the other tenants have NO LIGHT in our communal hall downstairs. But still they have not fixed it. So last Tuesday I went in person myself to the office of my housing association in London and saw in person who I think was the duty housing officer. I told her we have no light in our communal hall and no one has been round to fix it. She said the HA would phone me and let me know when they were coming round. But when I got home I found that nobody from my HA had phoned. So the next day,I phoned my HA again and made a complaint. The woman I spoke to said that an electrician would be round on Friday(last Friday) but again nobody turned up. So yesterday,Monday I made another complaint to my housing association and this time they told me they would be round yesterday. But you guessed it,nobody from my HA has showed up,the repair has not been done. So I and my next door neighbor have now been without lighting in our communal have in our block for over 2 weeks and the housing trust won't fix. I have tried everything I can to resolve this I have phoned my HA,I have been to the office,I have complained to the HA manager but they still won't fix that light. they keep on saying they are sending someone round but they don't turn up to fix and we still have NO Light in our communal hall. Another problem is that my next door neighbors opposite me don't speak much English,so I cannot communicate with them.Also they have not complained,I am the only one who reported the repair.Though that's not the point as it has been 2 weeks and we haveno light in the hall for 2 weeks.So where do I go from here? should I now go to Environmental Health also known as public protection at my local council? as I heard that they can force my HA to do the repair.Can anybody help.

Hi guys, I think I’ve got a good idea on what to expect but just want to get some general feedback on my position. Apologies in advance, I have been known to get a bit long winded. I will be defending against a county court claim for possession for rent arrears at a hearing on Tuesday 7th May. The claim is made for possession under Grounds 10 and 11 of the Housing Act 1988 Section 8 as amended by section 151 of the Housing Act 1996. The tenancy is an Assured Non-Shorthold Tenancy with rental of £84.47 payable weekly in advance on a Monday & the total arrears claimed is £675.76p, but had been up at £1202.28 in mid October. The tenancy was initiated by my Late Mother in August 2009 and I succeeded to the tenancy in February 2012 as the only tenant. All arrears have been cleared and rent for period between issue of claim and hearing date have been made with the exception of that rent which falls due on the day of the hearing by way of the previous day being a bank holiday. Following receipt of the claim pack I contacted the H/A advising that all outstanding amounts had been cleared, they advised that they would still pursue a suspended possession order in case of arrears at a later date. I was in receipt of Housing Benefit until I returned to work in June with a Housing benefit overrun till end of June. This is where the problems began, I put my hands up I started the ball rolling on this one, I had a period when I First returned to work where I basically went off the rails and had one hell of a blow out when I wasn’t working. I prioritised making sure Mums grave was properly marked and settling outstanding funeral amounts. I’m aware not a priority legally but this is my mum and for me there is no higher priority. In September my housing association wrote to me regarding the arrears, I contacted them and offered to make a monthly payment of £500 at the end of the first week of each month, they agreed and advised that if I had any problems that i should contact them and they’d do what they could to help. The first payment was agreed for October to allow things to fall into line with a budget I had come up with. In December I advised the H/A of changes in circumstance (Hours worked and extra travel costs) and was advised no change of agreement possible. I have since made what payments I could when I could, whilst I have been trying to get on my feet financially. Below is a list of payments made 18/10 - £500 06/11 - £500 09/12 - £400 14/01 - £125 17/01 - £125 24/01 - £125 31/01 - £464 31/01 - £11 02/02 - £42.15 28/03 - £422.35 04/04 - £337.88 03/05 - £337.88 Now I know that in the real world there is very little to no chance of any Judge granting possession for arrears where arrears no longer exist and the Tenant has made an effort to redress the amounts outstanding. My concerns are over statement’s made in the claim by the H/A, I believe may constitute a breach of pre action protocol guidelines. They claim to have written to me, yes they have continuing to threaten eviction even after an agreement had been made and before any breach of that agreement. They have tried to telephone me, I have not received any calls from them nor any messages left on my answerphones, either land-line or mobile. They claim to have sought to meet with me and have carded my home, certainly not the case, I work nights as a guard and I'm in the house all day just about every day, I don’t sleep well and have a Jack Russell who uses the front door as a trampoline and barks non-stop when somebody calls, and as I live alone I am the only one who would pick up anything through the letterbox. They maintain I have failed to contact following written communication and have failed to keep to an agreement to repay the arrears by affordable repayments. It is my understanding that certain other steps should be taken following issue of proceedings, such as those below, Not later than ten days before the date set for the hearing, the landlord should – provide the tenant with up to date rent statements;( Not Happened, last rent statement back at end of February). Disclose what knowledge he possesses of the tenant's housing benefit position to the tenant. ;( Not Happened). The landlord should inform the tenant of the date and time of any court hearing and the order applied for. The landlord should advise the tenant to attend the hearing as the tenant's home is at risk. Records of such advice should be kept. ;( Not happened only court papers) If the tenant complies with an agreement made after the issue of proceedings to pay the current rent and a reasonable amount towards arrears, the landlord should agree to postpone court proceedings so long as the tenant keeps to such agreement. (Would only consider stop proceedings if I put rent account 1 month in advance as I pay monthly) Any opinions input would be greatly appreciated