Office Service charge Query

teneighty

As others have suggested, you need to read through your lease very carefully. It would be unusual for a lease with such a short term to contain such an onerous requirement. In commercial leases "repair" has a very broad meaning which can include replacement

Have you tried discussing it with the City Surveyors? When I dealt with them a few years ago they were quite reasonable.
It is clearly inequitable that you have to pay for an asset that the landlord will benefit from for the next 40 or 50 years and you only have a 5 year term on your lease. However commercial leases can be inequitable so if they won't be reasonable I suggest you need to consult a solicitor who specialises in commercial property law.

Good Luck

propertyman

clockworks wrote: »

The Tennant on the fourth floor who moved in 4 months ago, doesn't have to pay anything as his service charge was capped. How is this even fair?

This what I was alluding to earlier, it is a negotiation and advice would have helped you.

As it is, you start with reading the whole lease to work who does what and who pays for what to put "repair and maintain" into context.

Then we can help further.

propertyman

JQ. wrote: »

So you agree with me, and therefore my advice was correct - no sinking fund provision for replacement no liability for replacement. .

:eek: I am not sure what you read, it certainly wasn't my post. A liability to pay has nothing to do with the existence or otherwise of a sinking fund. You said a landlord should have a SF, I said no his obligations are limited to those in the lease.

JQ. wrote: »

There are plenty of 5 year leases in place with sinking fund provisions in place without them becoming unmarketable..

And as you can see an adjoining tenant managed to negotiate a capped service charge indicating some resistance in that market , as I allowed for in the post.

JQ. wrote: »

Of course you can appeal the Service Charge - that's the whole point of providing audited accounts to tenants - to enable them to assess them and then object if they feel they are not correct. There's an entire industry of people (solicitors & surveyors) who's job is to act for occupiers in this respect.

No, there is no appeal, they can dispute it under the terms of the lease and any contract around that, under the supply of good and services legislation and mediate arbitrate or litigate. You might be conflating rights for dwelling houses with commercial units.

JQ. wrote: »

It's all well and good telling someone to read the lease and all become clear, but the reality is that commercial leases are invariably badly worded with terms not always recognisable to a non-property person. Similarly, omissions from leases (which it's unlikely the OP will realise) can also have a significant impact. So, my advice still stands, get someone who knows what they are doing to read the lease and let them advise on what action to take.

How do you advise someone to look at a lease and then denigrate the suggestion that leases could be read but are often "unreliable"?

Your reply is muddled and betrays an ignorance in the last section of simple principles such as the function of a lease and the grant of obligations.