Rental Repairs

Bert20123

I apologise firstly if this topic has come up before.

We currently rent a property in which we paid one years rent upfront due to working issues and due to time restraints on the moving date signed the inventory without checking the property, this has since been gone through, amended and agreed by landlord and letting agent.

We moved in 7 weeks ago and all of the discrepancies on the inventory have since been rectified except for a couple that seem to be ongoing.

The gas oven did not seem to work properly, though it worked it was not right so we did not use it, someone came out to look at it and agreed it needed changing and using it would be virtually impossible. On the date it was changed they said that he wiring to the gas hob was incorrect and disconnected the ignition switch. They said this would need rewiring and they would let the letting agent know, it does work but we need to manually ignite this. It took three weeks from us informing the letting agent of the oven issue to it being replaced. We have since waited another two weeks only to find out by calling the letting agent that the rewire will not happen because the oven and hob are usable.

My question is, being usable is not the same as being in proper working order, where do we stand on this matter?

The second point is to do with a en-suite shower, which stopped working, we informed the letting agent again and their plumber came out. He did the quote for this and other jobs, the shower had been fitted upside down which was the problem. The work commenced but the en-suite shower was not done as they did not have the part. The plumber said he would let the letting agency know, we this time waited four weeks until contacting the letting agency to ask what was happening, where they informed us that the part was really hard to get hold of and that they were liaising with the landlord on what to do. We have since been told this by the letting agency "if this were your only shower it would have been attended sooner but we are aware that you have the family bathroom so this was not deemed as urgent."

These may sound like quite trivial points to some, but we have paid good money for our rent and I do not feel we are being provided with the service from the letting agent.

Any help on this matter would be much appreciated.

Many Thanks.

[Deleted User]

Paying rent upfront means you have literally no bargaining chips, it means your landlord / letting agent can (and potentially will) do the minimum required by law and nothing more. There are some circumstances where if essential repairs aren't done by the landlord you can have them repaired yourself and deduct he cost from rent (following a very specific procedure) however you don't have that option... which means you're down to just begging.

Guest101

Actually that's not quite accurate. Check your tenancy, it should give a timeframe for repairs to be carried out.

You should avoid witholding rent until the VERY LAST option (not applicable here, but as general advice)

You have paid rent for use of the shower, if this facility is withdrawn, it brings into dispute the legitimacy of the rent paid. I would suggest that you contact the LL, or his management company, and request to carry out the repairs yourself, having received quotes. For which the LL would recompence you