HCR and MOD - Home Trashed - Help Needed

cshowell

Hello

Can anyone help us at all? My husband is in the Navy and has been posted to a different part of the UK for several years, so we let our home to the MOD via their agents HCR. We had redecorated and it was in immaculate condition, due to my husband and I not having lived there for more than 6 months in the 8 years since it had been built (I had my own home prior to our marriage and then we went into Married Quarters up country). We fully expected a family or some LTs to be put in there but HCR put some squaddies in who have trashed the place and left us with a bill of £5.5K (which we just can't afford as I am not working as I have a toddler, and my second baby is due on Christmas Eve).

HCR have told us that they have informed the MOD of this and they have come up with an offer of £1.8k to repair all the damage (things like door handles put through walls, bannisters removed, venetian blinds broken and then lost). They are even refusing to rectify damage that the tenants put in writing that they would repair, (when we found out about it and hit the roof). I cried when I saw what they had done to our lovely house.

HCR claim to have informed the MOD about this, but we have reason to believe that they have not, as if a claim is above a certain amount, they get charged for not monitoring the tenants. However, we have been unable to track down the person they are supposed to be dealing with at the MOD (as unsurprisingly they won't tell us).

My question: Does anybody know who in the MOD deals with HCR as we want to contact them directly?

Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Carolyn

spike7451

cshowell wrote: »

Hello

Can anyone help us at all? My husband is in the Navy and has been posted to a different part of the UK for several years, so we let our home to the MOD via their agents HCR. We had redecorated and it was in immaculate condition, due to my husband and I not having lived there for more than 6 months in the 8 years since it had been built (I had my own home prior to our marriage and then we went into Married Quarters up country). We fully expected a family or some LTs to be put in there but HCR put some squaddies in who have trashed the place and left us with a bill of £5.5K (which we just can't afford as I am not working as I have a toddler, and my second baby is due on Christmas Eve).

HCR have told us that they have informed the MOD of this and they have come up with an offer of £1.8k to repair all the damage (things like door handles put through walls, bannisters removed, venetian blinds broken and then lost). They are even refusing to rectify damage that the tenants put in writing that they would repair, (when we found out about it and hit the roof). I cried when I saw what they had done to our lovely house.

HCR claim to have informed the MOD about this, but we have reason to believe that they have not, as if a claim is above a certain amount, they get charged for not monitoring the tenants. However, we have been unable to track down the person they are supposed to be dealing with at the MOD (as unsurprisingly they won't tell us).

My question: Does anybody know who in the MOD deals with HCR as we want to contact them directly?

Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Carolyn

The is a board here;

http://www.arrse.co.uk/property/

where you should find your answer,(ARRSE is an Army forum)

Naval_Families_Federation

Hello Carolyn,

I am sorry to hear about your situation. I have spoken to our Housing Specialist who suggests you contact the Customer Services Manager at Defence Estates Operations Housing to discuss what has happened to the property and how best to recover the charges.

Put all your information down in writing and send to:
Customer Services Manager
Defence Estates Operations Housing
Room S201, Building 351
RAF Brampton
Huntingdon
Cambs
PE28 2EA

As an aside, presumably you signed a contract - look into what the agreement undertaken states for this type of situation.

Best of luck, I hope you get the problem resolved. Do come back to us if you require further assistance.

Kind regards,
Emma Prince
Marketing & Communication Manager
Naval Families Federation

NFF: Castaway House, 311 Twyford Avenue, Portsmouth, PO2 8RN
Tel: 023 9265 4374

BLT_2

You signed over your house to the MOD and 'expected them to put a family or some Lts in there'? Why on earth would you expect that? When you let your house through the HCR the next person in there is whoever is on the list for that area. You don't get a choice whether it's a couple of squaddies, two pillow biting matlows or a couple of effeminate RAF types

That said I am surprised that the HCR didn't actually carry out a proper inspection before handing the house back. You have my condolences, most individuals occupying SSSA accommodation are decent, you were just unfortunate.

On the plus side it could have been a couple of sailors and you would have been finding gay !!!!!! under the carpets and hidden under the floorboards for years to come :-)

cshowell

BLT wrote: »

You signed over your house to the MOD and 'expected them to put a family or some Lts in there'? Why on earth would you expect that? When you let your house through the HCR the next person in there is whoever is on the list for that area. You don't get a choice whether it's a couple of squaddies, two pillow biting matlows or a couple of effeminate RAF types

That said I am surprised that the HCR didn't actually carry out a proper inspection before handing the house back. You have my condolences, most individuals occupying SSSA accommodation are decent, you were just unfortunate.

On the plus side it could have been a couple of sailors and you would have been finding gay !!!!!! under the carpets and hidden under the floorboards for years to come :-)

To a certain extent you are right, although that self-evidently doesn't excuse the extensive damage clocked up over a relatively short period. With the benefit of hindsight and having re-read the clauses in the tenancy agreement which ultimately we stupidly signed up to, (a mistake we will not be repeating), it is clear that HCR can do pretty much what they want providing they don't exceed the stated number of occupants. Which incidentally they also did, invalidating our insurance. In our defence however the area is a navy area with a well known shortage of (Service Families) SFA housing, and we naively assumed, (that being the mother of all f*ck ups), that HCR would use what is self-evidently a family house to house a family, at an appropriate grade (i.e. a Lieutenant's family, in what amounts to a 'type 5' property); it didn't occur to us that HCR would take what is clearly a family house and use it as a SSSA for multiple occupancy cycling a number of individuals through over the period. I do not call this SSSA as I understand it, I call it a one-shot barrack block, which manifestly the house is not.

I guess the lesson here is that, as you correctly point out in a less than flattering way, once HCR get their hands on it, they can do exactly what they want, even if the house self-evidently does not lend itself to it.

One way or another, this is one to watch for anyone thinking of renting their home through HCR to the MOD.

I might add that in a recent edition of the RAF newpaper, a gay serviceman states that he has "met many gay people in the armed forces, most of them in the RAF". I can wholeheartedly agree. I have also met many gay people in the RAF. However possibly not in the way he meant it. I am not sure that your assessment of sailors stacks up.

There are few RAF personnel in our area.

peteuk

I could never understand when there is a shortage of SFA.....they put in a house, 3 singlies. But before they put them in they will do up the place.....

Totally unfare on families........