Given 'abatement notice' for noise - but haven't been in property for a few weeks

Willeh

Hello,

Thank you for clicking and giving this a read.

I am not able to get in touch with my local city council until Monday but I would just like some reassurance in the interim.

For the past few weeks - since the end of March, we have been temporarily living in an AirBnB rental in London for a work placement. We returned home today for a few hours to check post, water plants etc, and to our surprise we had received two letters - the first dated mid-April and the second dated two days ago, with regards to excessive noise (from an amplified speaker) coming from our flat in the afternoons on these two occasions; the second letter was accompanied by the abatement notice.

Our flat is in a building of three flats in total. The building itself is right in the city centre, surrounded by other commercial and residential buildings. We rent our flat and we have not sublet any part of it out.

We are able to provide an extensive range of evidence to prove that we have been away for all of this time - and most certainly on the two days that the complaints have been logged and witnessed: from our AirBnB rental receipts to statements from work, heck even oyster transactions on the tube and our phone GPS logs.

It's an annoying amount of extra effort but I am going to whole heartedly appeal this abatement notice come Monday morning. I can see though that the process of appealing requires a magistrates hearing which is slightly daunting.

For both the feeling of having done something about it today, as well as for our reassurance: could this in any way go wrong? Our array of evidence is water-tight, however the letters from the city council claim that the excessive noise has been "witnessed" by them?

Thanks again.

keith969

Have you talked to your neighbours - have they had a problem with noise? You should also contact your local environmental health people on Monday to ask why you have been served a notice when you clearly weren't there to cause the noise. If there is no proof that the noise was coming from your flat then there should be no problem appealing.

Willeh

Thanks for your reply keith969.

I managed to speak to one of our neighbours yesterday who lives downstairs. She said that over the past few weeks, loud music has been coming from a source somewhere that is very near / in our building.

Yes, I will give our local council / environmental health dept. a call tomorrow and see what they say. The idea of having to attend a magistrates hearing for something we weren't even around for is frustrating. Doesn't make it any easier that we are still two hours away in London.

I'm just a bit worried over the thought that this could potentially drag out: if the council remains adamant it was coming from our flat yet we continue to stand by the fact that we were not even there at the date and times of the incidents. But until tomorrow: trying to find the balance between preparing for the worst and not over-thinking!

Norman_Castle

I would check you haven't accidentally set the timer on something.

Willeh

Thanks for your reply Norman Castle.

Yes we thought that too, so we checked anything which could have produced "loud amplified music" or even a prolonged loud noise, but we had turned everything off at the socket before we left.
We have all of the spare keys with us, nothing under a door mat etc. The only other people who have potential access are the lettings people / landlord.

The evidence will remain a mystery until tomorrow but as said I just wanted to prepare for resistance / the worst.

I wonder how likely the city council / environmental dept. will admit fault as there are two other flats in the building and we are right in the city centre, tightly surrounded by other buildings.

Waterlily24

Good luck Willeh, hope you can get things sorted easily.

pogofish

I had this a few years back - It turned out that one of my neighbours, a single man was trying to bump-up his priority for local authority housing by claiming there was a raft of nuisance issues with his fellow residents.

Only he didn't bank on the council taking his claims seriously and treating the rest of us as guilty until proven innocent.

We had months of dragged-out meetings with the authority who flatly refused to consider our side of the argument and actively threatened us with further sanctions should we dare to take legal advice. Instead they forced us into a forever escalating set of restrictions as his complaints become more and more preposterous.

Eventually, sick of being forced to creep around on tiptoe at all times of the day and dare to not even fart after 10pm, I challenged the council to put-up or shut-up. The dates of complaints they eventually provided tallied nicely with periods I'd been working abroad, with only one falling outside that period and that was attributed to the landlord being really tardy about getting a failing boiler pump repaired.

So I communicated this back to them, with proof and sought legal advice but the jokers didn't back down. It took the complainant themselves to make a complaint about one of their own enforcement officers climbing the stairs in daytime for them to finally rip-up his complaints!

:mad:

Marktheshark

The only option is to file an appeal at the local magistrates court.

Or you can waste your time on the phone.
The desk clerk will help you fill in the appeal form.

As you can be jailed if they decide you have done it again I would get that appeal in very quickly.