Tenant seeking compensation following a bed bug infestation.

gary83

+ 1 for not discussing the situation anymore with the father, the contract is between you & the tenant.

Id give his legal threats a stiff ignoring as well, he’s just trying it on. apart from anything else If the first legal advisor told him he had such a strong case why would he bother going and seeing two more? 

Did the tenant or pest controllers advise you the property was going to be uninhabitable for ten days and ask you to provide alternative accommodation, or did they just source it themselves and then much later present the bill?

Kyresa

I'm going to add as well that the tenant has a duty to mitigate her loss.   to carry on living in the property for three months before anything was done about it THEN wanting compensation for that?  She'll be laughed out of court.  There's no claim there. 

notrouble

Liability depends on responsibility. So who was responsible for the introduction of the bedbugs? The Landlord? The previous tenant? This tenant? Someone else (eg a visitor to the tenant)?

If one of the first 2, the landlord should :

a) deal with the problem (as has been done)

b) pay for laundry as advised by pest controller, and

c) compensate the tenant (eg via a rent reduction) for loss of use of one room for 10 days. That does not include cost of alternative accomodation since the property as a whole was not uninhabitable - just the room being treated.

I do not believe 'trauma' is relevant.

If one of the last two, all costs are the responsibility of the tenant.

Given that the tenancy started at end Sept, and the problem was only reported in January, after 3 months, it seems on the balance of probability that the bedbugs arrived after the tenancy started. This is additionally likely since the pest controller said "the room was not overly infested but need to be treated before it got worse". This suggests a new(ish) infestation - had the infestation pre-dated the tenancy it is likely to have been far more severe by January.

Of course, if a dispute over compensation escalates as far as court, it is impossible to be sure how a judge would decide. My best guess is as above but judges can be fickle, and applicants and defendants can present facts to their own advantage......

Skiddaw1

Just love the bit about trauma and permanent scarring. That's seriously trying it on. Bed bug bites are annoying but anyone would think the tenant had contracted small-pox...

notrouble

Skiddaw1 said:

Just love the bit about trauma and permanent scarring. That's seriously trying it on. Bed bug bites are annoying but anyone would think the tenant had contracted small-pox...

Careful! Posters have been banned from the forum for expressing unsympathetic views like this.........

sgun

Our tenants brought in bed bugs, they were mortified  but we told them its just one of those things. We went 50/50 on the treatment. 
The treatment is done twice over 2 weeks and you can get back in the room about 3 hours after each treatment. It's just a spray for a low level case, no need at all to move out. I know loads of people in London who have had bed bugs and none of them have had to move out - check with your pest controller why he offered that as advice (maybe he didn't and your tenant is just trying it on).

Skiddaw1

That's a good point @sgun . Friends of mine had a bed bug issue in their new house (confined to two rooms) shortly after moving in and had to have three lots of treatment to finally eradicate them. It was disruptive and irritating but they didn't have to move out.

[Deleted User]

My understanding of bed bugs is you MUST actually stay in the property or they come back. The bugs are attracted to carbon dioxide released on sleeping. This draws the eggs to open and then the bugs get the poison in their system. Otherwise they can remain dormant for up to 18 months as the poison does not kill the eggs. 

Im sorry I cant help with the other problem 

davidmcn

As above, assuming the landlord has insurance, and that they have something resembling a legal claim from the tenant (rather than from the tenant's dad), they should just be referring it to the insurers and letting them sort it out.

olbas_oil

Densol said:

My understanding of bed bugs is you MUST actually stay in the property or they come back. The bugs are attracted to carbon dioxide released on sleeping. This draws the eggs to open and then the bugs get the poison in their system. Otherwise they can remain dormant for up to 18 months as the poison does not kill the eggs. 

Search on youtube for home made bedbug traps. You isolate the bed by placing bed legs in a double layer of plastic pots (one inside the other). You do need a source of carbon dioxide. This can be you, as you sleep on the bed, or you can make a Co2 generator (like brewing beer) with the gas being fed into the trap. Great fun in the mornings to see what you've caught!