council tenant keeps flooding my flat

zet_2

deborahmackay wrote: »

hello

the problem is that in the last 18 months my upstairs neighbour has flooded my flat 9 times (4 times in the last 3 months!) he is a council tenant and is completly unable to maintain his tenancy due to drug abuse and mental illness.

Crickey, I'm surprised your insurer did not try to recover the money from the council the first time. I would certainly consult a solicitor. The council is his landlord, if after the 2nd or 3rd time, they did not evict him, then there would seem to be the possibility that the council are somewhat complicit in the damage. I would get a solicitor to start trying to reclaim your losses.

Councils are very stubborn, their legal teams have lots of cases and may delay, fail to turn up at court, and generally be completely negligent. However, what else can you do?

This tenant is probably penniless, but I would still ask my solicitor if he/she can get an injunction against the tenant.

mchale

Do you pay a service charge to the council, If you do this should include ins cover, I would look into claiming off that policy rather than your own, as this will then involve the council, so maybe they will act a bit quicker.

frankie160565

deborahmackay wrote: »

Hello all who responded

Thanks for all your advice.

My flat is in Stirling in Scotland

I have notified his housing officer of the state of things regarding his mental state, and they say that they are working on this, but for obvious reasons I am not privy to what they are doing.

I have written to them on a few occasions, but will up my game regarding this.

I am sure that he doesn’t do it deliberately, and I have been to speak to him on a number of occasions, but he is totally detached from reality, I think he may have fried his brain with these crazy drugs! The last time I spoke to him, he was threatening to harm himself, and I went straight to see his housing officer in person to let him know of the situation.

I discovered the LG Ombudsman website after I posted here, so will give them a phone today.

Thanks for all your responses it is really appreciated

Deborah

Hi Deborah, Ive got the same problem,3 times Ive been flooded and 1 was on the week I had my £10k kitchen installed which had to be removed again. I was flooded 4 weeks ago and then Last week my living room ligh started flashing because she done it again and told everyone I threw my tea into my light switch....This time I contacted the housing manager, the council risk department,the anti social task force and also my lawyer as well as the insurance lawyer and Im ensuring the council act under their duty of care to me .Im insisting that they make it part of her tenency agreement that she takes out the council insurance for 75 pence per week and have informed them that if they fail to act they are culpable and will instruct my lawyer to sue them for criminal neglegence.

Dont let them off by saying theres nothing they can do..its a cop out threaten them with the local newspapers as well.
cheers
Frankie