Housing Benefit Issue

Rye_2

Hello All

Im currently on Incap/Income support for depression/anxiety/panic attacks/anger issues and am also receiving housing benefit for my privately rented 1 bedroom flat.

Around August/September this year my landlord increased my rent, he sent me a new tenancy agreement and told me to send it off to my local council for them to approve this increase.

A month or so later I received a letter from my local council stating that they have already evaluated my rent in May and I have to wait until May 09 for it to be re-evaluated.

(I have never been sent any notification of rent re-evaluation dates and apparently my landlord doesnt get notified.)

I informed my landlord (who also received a similar letter from the council) who didnt seem too happy and gave me a little time to try and sort out the problem.

Several weeks have passed and the relationship with my landlord has deteriated exponentially, he has sent me an eviction notice and i have to be out of my flat by Dec 20th.

After speaking to my local council and the rent officer several times I am basicly being told "tough luck".

The only advice they gave me was to

a) Ask my landlord to wait untill May 09
b) Apply for council housing

My question is has anybody ever been in such a situation and whats the best path to take so I dont end up homeless. The problem is the rent office evaluate the rent in May and wont touch it again for 52 weeks but my landlord increased my rent in August/September time, there is no communication between the 2 parties what so ever ( or so im told ) so they will not correlate on a particular date.

The rent office has said there is no chance for a re-evaluation before my eviction date, if at all.

My local council just keeps pointing me towards the rent office.

And with no solid information for my landlord, he is simply not interested in helping.

Sorry for the long post and thanks for your time.

[Deleted User]

As its a private let i assume you get local housing allowance and not housing benefit,that being the case the applicable amount will be set each year(obviously may in your area)I cant therefore see that there is much you can do except pay the difference if you can,tbh i`m not sure if there is additional funds you can apply for and hopefully someone who knows will be along shortly
welcome to MSE btw

Rye_2

Thanks for your welcome and reply.

After some research from this site it seems i have misunderstood how the system works.

I was under the impression that the rent officers evaluation was a brief window for which my landlord had to increase the rent.

After reading it seems that rent officer will evaluate the rent for the area on a yearly basis and that figure will stick for 1 year, if the landlord raises the rent and its under the particular figure it will be valid and he gets his increase, it seems my landlord has asked for more than the current LHA will allocate me.

After all the conversations I had with these people the system was never clearly explained to me, even any letters I recieved never explained anything.

Thanks to MSE I have a little more clarity on the situation.

Doesnt help me being homeless at Christmas but at least Ill understand how I got there :P

elmer

You need to apply for a Discretionary Housing Payment to cover the shortfall from the HB office. Go in and ask to apply, it is a pot of money available for these kind of circumstances, but it will only be awarded if your Council has money left.

Hope this helps

Elmer

Got2change

The charity SHELTER can be a good source of information and advice (and you don't have to be homeless....)

And to second the post above, apply for DHB - my Council has been brilliant, I got it paid for 2 x 2 month periods.

Rye_2

I will inquire, thx guys