Water leak in a leasehold flat

chazerjay

Hello,

Not entirely sure if this post belongs in this category but this is the closest I could find,so feel free to let me know if it needs moving somewhere else.

I own a leasehold flat and I've been having a water leak in the ceiling, through the electric fitting, in one of my bedrooms and informed the leaseholder above my flat in the first instance. She has been very laid-back so far to get it fixed and as a result I had to turn off power through circuit breaker which means I cannot turn on lights in few other places including the bathroom and master bedroom. So far it has taken seven days but the leak is ongoing. At one point I have had to send her a list of plumber contacts as she was telling me that she couldn't find a plumber to come in!?

Apart from the damage to my ceiling due to the slow response by the leaseholder, I also couldn't use my computer setup, which is in the same room, and I was working on a project that had a tight deadline and this was massively affected as a result. I have a special workspace setup that cannot be moved due to the amount of space it takes. I'm really stressed right now as the leaseholder doesn't seem to care much about me not being able to turn on lights in my flat nor about the financial loss I'm incurring due to inaccessibility of my workspace.

Having spoken to the management company I was told that any material damage to my property will be covered under buildings insurance but I wondered what's the route to compensate for the productivity loss and not being able to turn on lights for over eight days?

Any advice is massively appreciated.

Thanks.

davidmcn

If your business can be easily affected in this way then don't you have insurance to cover the risk? I can't see that upstairs is going to be liable for consequential loss (leaving aside the question of whether your leases permit you to use the premises for business purposes...).

SmashedAvacado

chazerjay wrote: »

Hello,


Having spoken to the management company I was told that any material damage to my property will be covered under buildings insurance but I wondered what's the route to compensate for the productivity loss and not being able to turn on lights for over eight days?

Any advice is massively appreciated.

Thanks.

Do not waste your energy on this. Concentrate on ensuring that the damage is repaired. This will of course mean that your building insurance for the block goes up. If there's an excess you might ask your neighbour to pay this.

chazerjay

Thanks for the reply davidmcn. The workspace is for my part-time freelance work and doesn't operate as a business premise although I do have home insurance. It has taken seven days so far yet the leak is continuing and the leaseholder is not even responding to my queries. I consider this to be sheer negligence even after I emphasized the potential danger as it involved electrics. Shouldn't it have been resolved by now as the tenants who live are very flexible about entering into the property?

chazerjay

SmashedAvacado wrote: »

Do not waste your energy on this. Concentrate on ensuring that the damage is repaired. This will of course mean that your building insurance for the block goes up. If there's an excess you might ask your neighbour to pay this.

Thanks SmashedAvacado - It's pretty frustrating when the neighbour just doesn't care to get it done soon when she very well know that I cannot use lights in more than half of the house!

SmashedAvacado

Presumably you can get a lamp and plug it into a socket in the meantime.

AnotherJoe

If you have legal cover, then get them on the case. I would think (IANAL) that if it continues for longer than is reasonable, that you do have a claim for some sort of compensation.

eddddy

In purely legal terms, once you had informed your neighbour of the leak, they had a duty to take 'reasonable' steps to deal with it (e.g. turn off the water supply, call a plumber immediately etc).

If they didn't take reasonable steps, they were negligent. And you could claim reasonably foreseeable damages from them for their negligence.

If you told the neighbour at the time that you worked from home, and the leak was stopping you working - a court might agree that damages should include loss of income from that point forward (I don't know).

But whether that's something you want to fight is another matter.



TBH, there may be a similar issue with the buildings insurance.

If you informed the neighbour of the leak, but the neighbour did not take reasonable steps to fix it (e.g. turn off the water supply, call out a plumber etc) - the insurers may refuse to pay for any damage caused after you told the neighbour.

So you would have to claim for extra damage caused after you told them, direct from your neighbour (who might have a different insurance policy that covers that).

Also, the buildings insurance policy will almost certainly have an excess (sometimes as high as £500), which you would normally have to pay.

chazerjay

SmashedAvacado wrote: »

Presumably you can get a lamp and plug it into a socket in the meantime.

Yup - had to buy some cheap desk lamps until the electrics are sorted but the point is that it shouldn't have been going on for this long...

chazerjay

eddddy wrote: »

In purely legal terms, once you had informed your neighbour of the leak, they had a duty to take 'reasonable' steps to deal with it (e.g. turn off the water supply, call a plumber immediately etc).

If they didn't take reasonable steps, they were negligent. And you could claim reasonably foreseeable damages from them for their negligence.

If you told the neighbour at the time that you worked from home, and the leak was stopping you working - a court might agree that damages should include loss of income from that point forward (I don't know).

But whether that's something you want to fight is another matter.



TBH, there may be a similar issue with the buildings insurance.

If you informed the neighbour of the leak, but the neighbour did not take reasonable steps to fix it (e.g. turn off the water supply, call out a plumber etc) - the insurers may refuse to pay for any damage caused after you told the neighbour.

So you would have to claim for extra damage caused after you told them, direct from your neighbour (who might have a different insurance policy that covers that).

Also, the buildings insurance policy will almost certainly have an excess (sometimes as high as £500), which you would normally have to pay.

Thanks very much for this very detailed reply, eddddy - much appreciated. Exactly what I thought as she never decided to turn off the water nor she sent any emergency plumber.

chazerjay

AnotherJoe wrote: »

If you have legal cover, then get them on the case. I would think (IANAL) that if it continues for longer than is reasonable, that you do have a claim for some sort of compensation.

Thanks AnotherJoe