Please help re flat deposit

barnaby-bear

Are you mentioning the address, the pseudo-moving, the new address.... the refusal to give new address - oooh and the multiple names they are providing a front for.

EagerLearner

barnaby-bear wrote:

Are you mentioning the address, the pseudo-moving, the new address.... the refusal to give new address - oooh and the multiple names they are providing a front for.

Well, they only have 1 name for her, plus they have not refused to give us new address?

Mrs_pbradley936

You need to put in a sentence very early on about the agents chopping and changing their status – first they are involved because they are taking your money every month, then they are not because you are not longer renting via them, then they want to be involved again and ask you if the issue can be resolved on behalf of landlady.

You can even say that in your opening remarks to the Court – that they do not seem to be clear of their involvement themselves so how can you be expected to know and that is why you included them in the action. You are not to know that they do not abide by the ARLA guidelines because you assumed that all professional agents did (yes you did).

EagerLearner

pbradley936 wrote:

You need to put in a sentence very early on about the agents chopping and changing their status – first they are involved because they are taking your money every month, then they are not because you are not longer renting via them, then they want to be involved again and ask you if the issue can be resolved on behalf of landlady.

You can even say that in your opening remarks to the Court – that they do not seem to be clear of their involvement themselves so how can you be expected to know and that is why you included them in the action. You are not to know that they do not abide by the ARLA guidelines because you assumed that all professional agents did (yes you did).

Hi P - have adedd an opening statement to my summary - is it what you meant?

hjb123

Great news for you, have followed this thread from the beginning, it has gone on so long for you and you must be very pleased to have found that latest information out!

Mrs_pbradley936

Yes - but you need to make it so that it sums everything up in a few sentences. Imagine that you are the judge you need a few bullet points so that s/he is knows why you are there. If you are invited to expand then you can go into detail. If I can think of a few pointers I will included them within the next hour or so and if you like them use them.

EagerLearner

Thanks P - have revised it and added a bit at the end - will shorten once I have read your tips...

Mrs_pbradley936

We are here because of a dispute about a rental deposit paid to XYZ as the agents on behalf of Mrs ABC.

We have asked XYZ to return our deposit because we left the flat in good condition and spotlessly clean.

XYZ have declined to return our deposit and instead say that they have given it to Mrs ABC on the production of bogus invoices/receipts even though they knew full well that the matter was in dispute.

In addition they have not provided an address for Mrs ABC so that we were able to serve legal Notices.

We were not sure if we ought to have been paid by XYZ or Mrs ABC and so put both on the claim. We have been awarded judgement against Mrs ABC and are here to see if XYZ were acting correctly throughout the entire matter. We are young an inexperienced
and put ourselves in the hands of professionals because we thought that they had certified ARLA status and could be trusted to act properly Indeed their website says "We recruit only the most conscientious and highly trained staff who provide a level of expertise acutely needed in a market where clients demand ever-higher standards."

barnaby-bear

EagerLearner wrote:

Should I send 1 & 3 via Recorded Delivery?

Anyone want to do a quick summary of main points we should mention to make sure we don't miss out anything

The ones I have so far:

Opening statement:

We are taking action against letting agent due to the fact that they are the party to whom we gave our initial deposit and they are the party who acted on our behalf when liaising with the landlady during our tenancy and they collected rent from us over 2 years. When our deposit was not returned to us and we requested letting agent assistance prior to court action, they claimed to no longer be acting on our behalf. When court action was commenced, they confusingly claimed to act on our and the landlady's behalf by attempting to negotiate. We have been unsure of their status since the dispute began, therefore decided to include them in our court action.


- June 5th - Letting agent did not permit us to be present at checking-out

- To date Letting agent has still not provided us with a copy of the check-out inventory

- 14th -26th July - Claimant wrote letters and e-mails to letting agent chasing return of deposit.

- 1st August - Letting agent did not attempt to resolve dispute and suggested we liaise with landlord directly as they were not managing the property. Letting agent stated a c/o address was the only address they had on file for landlady and did not assist us further. This was not satisfactory for court action.

- 3rd & 10th August - Letting agent and landlady were sent letters by the claimant stating court action would be taken if the dispute was not resolved.

- August 14th - Letting agent only supplied breakdown of costs on 14th August, deposit was due back 5th July. Letting agent and landlord did not take into account items mentioned on moving-in inventory, when calculating purported deductions to deposit. Letting agent permitted handwritten notes and estimates to be presented by landlord as actual expenses. Letting agent permitted a purported invoice from the landlord's address to be deducted from deposit.

- August/September - Claimant therefore researched online over several weeks and incurring more costs, discovered landlord real address - court action was commenced against her and also against letting agent, due to us being unsure about their status in this matter, in order to recover deposit from either party.

- 11th September - Once court action was commenced, the letting agent wrote a letter to claimant stating the landlord wished to resolve the dispute amicably Claimants were confused at re-involvement of letting agent.

- 2nd November - Once court judgement was awarded in claimants defense, claimant requested deposit in writing from letting agent via letter.

- 3rd November - Claimants received letter from letting agent stating that the disputed deposit money had been refunded by letting agent to the landlord on 15th August 2006, despite the dispute and despite questionable purported deductions and purported 'receipts and invoices' for such deductions.

The claimants are confused as to why on 1st August the letting agent claimed to no longer be involved, yet on the 11th September the letting agent offered to negotiate on the dispute - yet they had already seemingly given the deposit back to the landlord on 15th August (as per their letter of 3rd November).

I will fill in more dates later - any thoughts so far?

Can you mention wot-cha-ma-call-it legal acts that insists AST has court servable address and that letting agents did not supply such address within required no. of days

EagerLearner

Thanks PBradley - have edited post - anyone else have comments to add?

Barnaby - that'd be handy indeed, if I knew where the exact 'term' or legalese was written in this post... will have to look later unless someone happens to know what the act is called.