House guest flooded the bath; water seeped through the floor to the downstairs flat

Dragon_of_Consumer_Power

How would negligence be proven? However, bearing in mind that I have written to the letting agent to tell them how it happened (and who was the culprit), surely that in itself is enough proof of negligence?

lisyloo

How would negligence be proven?

Ultimately it's courts/judges that decide such things, but there are some standard scenarios.
e.g. if tiles fall off a well maintained roof in high winds then that's not negligence (a dalapidated roof would be different).

I am not a lawyer but if your friend was attending to their injuries then I don't think that's negligence. It's not like they left the bath and went down the pub.

The point that needs to be made and I don't think has been so far - is that if your friend wasn't negligent then they are not liable for the costs. It's a bit like high winds and roof tiles - sometimes genuinely no-one is to blame.
In this case the person affected needs to claim off their own insurance even though they weren't to blame either.
Most people would automatically assume the person that caused something is liable, but not if they weren't negligent.
Let me give you another example (this one from a lawyer). If you opened your windows and had music playing and a horse round the corner unseated a rider you would not be liable as you did nothing wrong and weren't liable.

If your friend refused to pay then they'd have to take him/her to court and get a judge to decide whether it was negligent or not. It's quite difficuilt to claim against individuals, for starters they may not have the money, but even if they did it's expensive to try to get it out of them. You can't actually get money from people if they don't have it even if you win.

I am not an expert but if I was in your situation my expectation would be that the people affected have to claim off their own insurance. I would expect the insurers who are paying to perhaps try a few letters e.g. ask about your/your guests insurance, but I would not expect them spend a lot of money trying to prove someone who was accidentally injured was negligent.
Of course those people who have to claim off their insurance policies may not be very happy with your guest or perhaps with you but if that's the law and that's insurance then they'll just have to take it on the chin.

Dragon_of_Consumer_Power

Thank you. Your points all sound salient - the only thing I'm worried about is that, ultimately, my girlfriend and I are on the tenancy agreement and I worry that thus the buck would stop with us? Or is that not true? I want to get Julian to sign an agreement that he will pay any costs incurred by his accidental flooding of the bath. Does this sound prudent?

I've also just had another email from the letting agent:

Richard unfortunately I can't confirm any insurance policies as these
are private matters between the individual owners and I simply do not
know.
As far as I am aware, there is nothing within the block factoring
insurance that would pay for this damage and Mrs Dhillon does not feel
that her insurance company can be involved.

I only know that 1, 7 and 11 have been affected and repairs were needed.
I don't know exactly what the damage was. Obviously you would be
entitled to have copies of any invoices that you were held responsible
for.
I'm sorry I can't be of more help at this stage.

If possible, I would like to accept your offer to visit the flat
sometime this week, only because we manage this property and it is my
job to make sure that it remains within the repairing standard. If you
let me know a suitable time, I will arrange to call at your convenience.

Quentin

You cannot expect your friend to accept liability because you feel morally he is!

It will be up to the others to prove negligence.

huckster

Dragon_of_Consumer_Power wrote: »

Thank you. Your points all sound salient - the only thing I'm worried about is that, ultimately, my girlfriend and I are on the tenancy agreement and I worry that thus the buck would stop with us? Or is that not true? I want to get Julian to sign an agreement that he will pay any costs incurred by his accidental flooding of the bath. Does this sound prudent?

I've also just had another email from the letting agent:

If you are just tenants, then you should get the owner or landlord to deal with this. They should be told about what is happening connected to the flat they own. If your friend was just stopping for the weekend, you will not have broken any tenancy agreement by sub letting, so they should be ok about it.

somethingcorporate

We had a leak (that 100% came from our flat) and it was covered under the buildings insurance that was shared by the whole block and it impacted the flat below.

It cost tens of thousands to rectify (they spent £14k putting us up in a hotel for 3 months) but that is another story of incompetence so do not let it colour your view.

If it were me I would be talking to my landlord to find out about the insurance and then point everything via them/the insurance company. At most your friend should be shelling out for the excess and nothing else and with our massive claim this was absorbed by the management fund as it ended up with joint liability on the claim as the flat below had a leak at the same time directly under ours that was leaking into their property (amazing coincidence!).

Dragon_of_Consumer_Power

OK, thanks guys. The landlady, whom we spoke to last night, said that her insurance would only cover the flat if she herself was in it. However, I'm keen to dig a little deeper as there *must* be buildings' insurance for the block - after all, there is some kind of building super who takes out the rubbish for collection, and who looks after the communal stairwell, etc.

Quentin

If there is or isn't insurance in place, that isn't your concern!

Unless negligence can be proven, the neighbours/landlord need to claim off their own insurance, or stump up themselves!

olly300

Quentin wrote: »

If there is or isn't insurance in place, that isn't your concern!

Unless negligence can be proven, the neighbours/landlord need to claim off their own insurance, or stump up themselves!

Well the OP can expect to be given notice if he takes that stance.

Quentin

olly300 wrote: »

Well the OP can expect to be given notice if he takes that stance.

An act of god for which he's blameless seems a harsh reason to suggest the op will be made homeless.