JB Leitch - Ground Rent Scam

ak1611

We received a letter from JB Leitch last week letting us know that our solicitor did not service notice of transfer to our landlord, therefore we have not paid any ground rent. Therefore we have incurred late fees, interest on the ground rent and legal fees (along with the ground rent figure which we have no issue with paying)

Our solicitor has confirmed that he did issue notice of transfer to the landlord, however he said that "it would appear that we did not include the fee on our statement of £87.50 twice which would need to be paid" therefore a small error on his part but not one that warrants the letter we have received from JB Leitch.

Our solicitor reached out to JB Leitch on Wednesday last week and when I followed up with him today, he has still not received a response from them.

My solicitor will only reply to one email of mine per day - naturally frustrating but I realise he does have other work to be getting on with.

We were given 14 days to pay the debt to JB Leitch, we now have one week remaining.

What do we do if they just don't respond to my solicitor? I'm happy to pay the ground rent figure, I'm just disputing the other costs from them.

Surely, it would have made more sense for the landlord to reach out to us and give us notice that we hadn't paid and they were waiting for it rather than taking legal action? We never received any correspondence.

Do I call the landlord and settle the £300 or do I hold off until they reply? If they do!

There are so many threads on here about this exact issue but none detail how the situation has been resolved. I really want to avoid paying £1000 if I can but worried that it'll end up turning into a higher figure if it doesn't get resolved within the 14 day period.

Any help would be appreciated!

Jamienico1

The bully’s who need to be struck of , they’ve gave me the worst 3 weeks of my life and something need to be done to company’s who operate just to bring misery to peoples lives , I’ve never received ground rent or be contacted by a supposed management company who Collects it , I received a court summons of these clowns unless I pay nearly 5 grand ! My original bill is 1500 but I’ve never received any bill or invoice at my property only and they want nearly 3500 for it to go away they say ! There bully’s and I hope someone puts a stop to there antics very soon

Jamienico1

Soon as they knew I appointed a solicitor, a week before court they have now dropped the settlement by 1500 , lets see what these scum bags do next week before the court date .

bouicca21

Just do a search on this forum to find out (lots) more about this firm and ways of dealing with them.

Jamienico1

Do not back down to these clowns , they threaten people with Court action and all other scare monger tactics but back down when you stand up to them ! They are scum of the earth .

pioneer22

i cannot describe how much of a bunch of c**ts these guys are.

Cornel88

What was the outcome of it? I am in the same position as you, my solicitor sent them the notice transfer and updated the adress for mail delivery. Did not receive any bills from them just the letter from leitch.

ethank

If your solicitor made a mistake and did not pay this, they should put you in the position that you would have been had they paid it. Tell them to sort it out of you'll go through the complaints process.

adgabaker

I'm a landlord whose tennant didn't pass on the ground rent invoices to me. The outstanding ground rent is £175 and JB Leitch have presented me with a bill for £2966. That means that JBL's charges are £2791. How can they justify that?

It seems that JB Leitch can charge what they like. I wonder if Freehold Managers have a financial interest in JB Leitch?

jaybeetoo

You need to make sure the freeholder and management company have a correspondence addresses for you.

It could be that your solicitor provided your correspondence address and the freeholder has assumed you’re moving into the new property which is why they are sending correspondence there. If that’s the case you shouldn’t have to pay for their incorrect assumption. Call them.

peterrodgers

These people have gained notoriety for their bullying, heartless approach. They seem to have no interest in settling matters quickly and instead milk them for costs - very successfully.
Have caused much misery to many people. Only advice I can add would be to only deal with them in writing and write to you MP with details of their activities.