Estate Agent is taking me to court while court administrative errors in his favour

OliverStone

Hi all,

I rented a flat via an estate agent in November 2013.

Presently the estate agent has made a claim for possession under section 8 against me because he made unsafe works in the property and I called another engineer to repairs (and also I deducted the fees from the rent providing the receipt to estate agent).

I received a letter from the court last thursday in which the court made important administrative errors that could prevaricate my defence in favour of the estate agent.

As I will be travelling from tomorrow for two weeks and need to provide further evidence to the court in order to highlight their errors, I would like to know if I could send an email to the court in order to ask inform them that I will respond to their letter (received last Thursday) in the next 21 days instead of next14 days.

Thanks

redcard

Why can't you give any details on these so-called errors?

OliverStone

The errors are based on documents I sent and that the court service states they have never received.

dancingfairy

Are you still in the property? What initial tenancy agreement did you sign? A section21 is a no fault notice which if served correctly means the landlord will automatically gain possession.
the section 8 is in relation to the alleged arrears. It appears you may well have arrears unless you have followed a very specific process. Did you write to the landlord explaining the problems with the work that had been carried out? Did you give him/her a deadline in which to respond? Did you write again and point out that unless the work was done you would be witholding rent? The Shelter website takes you through how to enforce repairs but unless you have followed the process then you will be in rent arrears.
Shelter instructions are here: http://england.shelter.org.uk/get_advice/repairs_and_bad_conditions/tenants_repairs_and_improvements/tenants_doing_repairs
Did you contact environmental health at your council to get works enforced?
I wouldn't have thought that you can extend the court deadline in which to reply, otherwise everyone would be using it as a delaying tactic. You can always try though and explain the exceptional circumstances and see what they say.

df

POPPYOSCAR

OliverStone wrote: »

The errors are based on documents I sent and that the court service states they have never received.

Did you not keep copies of these documents then, that you can just resend?

OliverStone

It is section 8 only since it is a 12 months tenancy agreement.

OliverStone

POPPYOSCAR wrote: »

Did you not keep copies of these documents then, that you can just resend?

I have to add further documents since I would like to equally make a formal complaint to the court service.

POPPYOSCAR

OliverStone wrote: »

I have to add further documents since I would like to equally make a formal complaint to the court service.

What 'documents' do you need to make a complaint?

Did they lose everything you sent them or just some of it?

Did you send special delivery?

OliverStone

They said the have not received some of my documents and previous complaint to the court service (regarding the same issue).

pmlindyloo

OliverStone wrote: »

Hi all,

I rented a flat via an estate agent in November 2013.

Presently the estate agent has made a claim for possession under section 8 against me because he made unsafe works in the property and I called another engineer to repairs (and also I deducted the fees from the rent providing the receipt to estate agent).

I received a letter from the court last thursday in which the court made important administrative errors that could prevaricate my defence in favour of the estate agent.

As I will be travelling from tomorrow for two weeks and need to provide further evidence to the court in order to highlight their errors, I would like to know if I could send an email to the court in order to ask inform them that I will respond to their letter (received last Thursday) in the next 21 days instead of next14 days.

Thanks

Are you in England/Wales or Scotland?

If you require further time to submit your defence then I would telephone the court and ask what you have to do in order for this to happen. They are usually extremely helpful.

thequant

dancingfairy wrote: »

Are you still in the property? What initial tenancy agreement did you sign? A section21 is a no fault notice which if served correctly means the landlord will automatically gain possession.
the section 8 is in relation to the alleged arrears. It appears you may well have arrears unless you have followed a very specific process. Did you write to the landlord explaining the problems with the work that had been carried out? Did you give him/her a deadline in which to respond? Did you write again and point out that unless the work was done you would be witholding rent? The Shelter website takes you through how to enforce repairs but unless you have followed the process then you will be in rent arrears.
Shelter instructions are here: http://england.shelter.org.uk/get_advice/repairs_and_bad_conditions/tenants_repairs_and_improvements/tenants_doing_repairs
Did you contact environmental health at your council to get works enforced?
I wouldn't have thought that you can extend the court deadline in which to reply, otherwise everyone would be using it as a delaying tactic. You can always try though and explain the exceptional circumstances and see what they say.

df

The immediate problem here is not the dispute but the process which could end up in a default judgement against the OP.


OP, can you give us a timeline of your correspondence from the court ?


e.g. when you get the claim form ? have you acknowledged service yet ? how have you been communicating with them ? etc etc