Challenging Service Charge Provider (Private Housing Estate)

rich20

Good evening,
I own a leasehold townhouse on a 250+ house housing estate. I currently pay around £500 per year in service charge fees and can't see how the service i'm paying for is benefiting me. I'm primarily interested in the simplest route available to reduce my fees. My second ambition would be to replace to service charge provider all together with a more cost effective provider. 

I would be really pleased to receive any advise from anyone who has experience and is able to offer assistance in either;
- challenging service charge providers directly on the grounds of the charges being unreasonable
- changing the service provider on a large private housing estate

Thanks.

NeilCr

Can we start with who the freeholder of the estate is

Is it a Residents Management Company or a separate private freeholder (like the builder for example) 

rich20

Thank you for your reply. 
As far as I can understand from my contract for sale, Bristol city council is the landlord, I pay a service charge fee to Chamonix estates and a ground rent fee to gateway property management. 

Hopefully this makes sense?' I'm completely confused by it all I'm afraid. 

eidand

I am just going to leave this here:
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.chamonixestates.co.uk

NeilCr

Information on service charges and how to challenge them here

https://www.lease-advice.org/advice-guide/service-charges-other-issues/

If Bristol Council own the freehold of the estate then they will employ Chamonix so you'd have to go through them to get a change

 Do other owners share your views?

rich20

@ Eidand. Thanks for the link. I'm well aware of their reputation, hence my keenness to get them changed.

rich20

@ NeilCr. Thanks for the link. I have talked to the lease advise advisors previously and they've basically warned legal costs could be recovered either via increased service charges or via me personally. I'm therefore hesitant to go to the first tier tribunal. 

Is there a legal right to  request the landlord to seek new tenders if I can show the current provider has been negligent? Or can this only be achieved via tribunal? 

daveyjp

If you can't see how it is benefitting you it sounds like a personal issue.  That won't gain traction with anybody.  A similar example is a resident living in a ground floor flat complaining about having to pay towards lift maintenance.

Do you have a breakdown of the charges?

If you are paying money and what you are paying for isn't being done you then have a valid complaint which you can take up with the provider and then the Council.

NeilCr

rich20 said:

@ NeilCr. Thanks for the link. I have talked to the lease advise advisors previously and they've basically warned legal costs could be recovered either via increased service charges or via me personally. I'm therefore hesitant to go to the first tier tribunal. 

Is there a legal right to  request the landlord to seek new tenders if I can show the current provider has been negligent? Or can this only be achieved via tribunal? 

Not that I am aware of

I'd have thought you might do better if a number of owners agree with you and you could approach the landlord as a group

Perhaps if you could explain why you don't see how it benefits you?

trex227

As daveyjp says- do you have a breakdown of the service charges? If you do, what aspect of what is being charged do you have an issue with? If you don't, request a copy of this from them. You're going to have to do a lot of investigation and research to go anywhere with this.

According to their website they are a member of The Property Redress Scheme. Put together a written complaint with what you are unhappy with e.g. they are charged £x for grass to be mowed but they're not doing it regularly and its left to grow long or whatever (the more genuine issues you can come up with the better) and send it to them. For the best chance of getting anywhere you'll really need to look into the fees, speak to other owners about what is being done/not done. Maybe even look into what reasonable prices are for whatever the services are.

They may refuse to deal with you as you haven't employed them- in this case redirect the complaint to the council. If Chamonix do engage with your complaint and you're not satisfied with the outcome go to the Property Redress Scheme. The complaint should be an internal process so I wouldn't think would affect the service charge in the same way incurring legal costs for solicitors to go to a tribunal would.

The government has been looking into leasehold reform for a few years now. Once you've got information together you might also want to approach your MP to see where the government is with doing something on this/put pressure on.

Presumably though when you bought you were informed of the service charges and agreed to purchase knowing this?

AdrianC

rich20 said:

I own a leasehold townhouse on a 250+ house housing estate. I currently pay around £500 per year in service charge fees and can't see how the service i'm paying for is benefiting me.

Read your lease. The service charges will be to maintain the common areas of the estate. This is information that should have been taken into account when you purchased the property.

If you think the work detailed in the service charge accounts is not being done, that's a different question.

I'm primarily interested in the simplest route available to reduce my fees. My second ambition would be to replace to service charge provider all together with a more cost effective provider.

It doesn't work like that...
The freeholder appoints an estate manager. This is documented in your lease.
If you buy the freehold, it will still be subject to rentcharges and/or covenants covering the maintenance of the common areas.

I would be really pleased to receive any advise from anyone who has experience and is able to offer assistance in either;
- challenging service charge providers directly on the grounds of the charges being unreasonable
- changing the service provider on a large private housing estate

Your only option would be to look into getting sufficient other residents together to look into right to manage.
https://www.lease-advice.org/advice-guide/right-manage/
However, I don't think this applies to common areas of estates.

I think your only options are going to be...
1. Live with it.
2. Move to somewhere that isn't part of an estate with maintained common areas.