court claim issue advice needed

okerho

hi,

I own a small apartment. with this i a have to pay a "property management company" for the up keep, as it is leasehold.
I have had issues with them for the past few months,
and have explained over the phone that I will not pay until they are resolved.
the account is now several months in arreas and they have sent me a court claim!
I assume they are trying to get a CCJ to pay the outstanding amount.
I have filled in the acknowledgement of service section of the paperwork,
and returned it back to the court.
I have asked for the hearing to be relocated, as it is not local to me.
I now have another 14 days to file my defense, which i will do, and counter claim,
due to the problems i have had with them.
Does anyone know what the procedure will be after they recevie my defense,
as i have not been through this process before.
and any advice as to how to handle the case would be much appreciated,
thanks

clutton_2

""explained over the phone"" - do you not have any written evidence ?

okerho

hi,
thanks for your reply.
if you mean by written evidence - letters that have been written from me to them?
no, i was not that sensible to do that unfortunately.
the advisor over the phone seemed helpful, and i thought the issue would get
handled in a resonable way - i was not expecting this.

clutton_2

you were several months in arrears - why were you not expecting this ?

without written record you will have a very poor case indeed.... how much do you owe ?

SouthCoast

If you lose the court case the management company of the property where I live would enforce the judgement by obtaining a charging order on the property.

blckbrd

What's the dispute and are calls recorded?If they are, ask for a copy of the tape for the court case.

Troubled_Joe

The claim won't be allocated to a track or new court until a DJ has looked at the papers after you have both filed allocation questionnaires. This will happen after you have filed your defence and the claim will likely to be moved to your local court as a Defendant in person.

Thereafter (assuming it is allocated to the small claims track) there will be a trial date set with standard directions for the filing and service of evidence probably 14 days prior to the hearing.

Fire_Fox

okerho wrote: »

hi,

I own a small apartment. with this i a have to pay a "property management company" for the up keep, as it is leasehold.
I have had issues with them for the past few months,
and have explained over the phone that I will not pay until they are resolved.
the account is now several months in arreas and they have sent me a court claim!
I assume they are trying to get a CCJ to pay the outstanding amount.
I have filled in the acknowledgement of service section of the paperwork,
and returned it back to the court.
I have asked for the hearing to be relocated, as it is not local to me.
I now have another 14 days to file my defense, which i will do, and counter claim,
due to the problems i have had with them.
Does anyone know what the procedure will be after they recevie my defense,
as i have not been through this process before.
and any advice as to how to handle the case would be much appreciated,
thanks

You are NOT legally entitled to withhold service charges except in very specific circumstances. Equally the management company are not entitled to take you to court for service charges that have been formally disputed - the matter must be dealt with by a Leasehold Valuation Tribunal. As you have not put your complaints into writing the service charges are NOT classed as under dispute: you will therefore likely lose in court.

I would strongly suggest you pay the arrears IMMEDIATELY, otherwise you will be liable for the full amount plus legal costs, you will get a CCJ and the amount can be added to your mortgage, which lenders take a dim view of. Note that by paying the arrears now (under protest) you reserve the right to challenge the service charges at an LVT and avoid losing the court case. If you are dead set on go ahead with lodging a defence I would simply ask for the matter to be referred to an LVT as the arrears are under dispute.

For how to properly query or formally dispute service charges see here:
http://www.lease-advice.org/publications/

okerho

thank you for all your advises,
especially Troubled_Joe and Fire Fox.
Merry Xmas.