Neighbour complaint about tenants

Marvel1

Hannimal said:

SpiderLegs said:

Unless you have concerns of your own it really isn’t down to you to get involved in. 

I think we all have some responsibility to safe guard those who can't do it for themselves if we are alerted to things like this. 

The neighbours had no trouble telling OP.

macman

Why your neighbours felt that they need to report this to you is beyond me. What part in this do they think the alleged abuser's LL should play?
If they believe abuse is going on, then they should inform the police or social services. Not the LL.
Seems like they want someone else to make the decision for them, when that other person has no evidence.

SpiderLegs

Hannimal said:

SpiderLegs said:

Unless you have concerns of your own it really isn’t down to you to get involved in. 

I think we all have some responsibility to safe guard those who can't do it for themselves if we are alerted to things like this. 

When you say ‘we’ it sounds very much like you just mean ‘the OP’.
After all, the number of people who now have been alerted to this alleged issue includes the neighbour, the OP, me, you and a few more people on this thread.

So I’m wondering what ‘we’ (I.e. you) are going to do about this? If we (I.e. you) truly had some responsibility then we (I.e. you) would be PM-ing the OP for some detail and getting straight on the phone to the police.

but we (I.e. you) are not going to do that. We (I.e. you) would much rather tell the OP what they should be doing instead. So that means that we (I.e you) are just hypocrites.

Scotbot

It depends why the neighbours think the child is being mistreated. I  wouldn't for example be overly concerned about a crying baby or a screaming toddler. Babies cry , some cry a lot and toddlers have screaming tantrums. I would be annoyed if I lived next to them though. Which makes me think the neighbour is more concerned about noise, if they were really concerned about abuse surely thet would report it to the council or police

Falafels

Scotbot said:

It depends why the neighbours think the child is being mistreated. I  wouldn't for example be overly concerned about a crying baby or a screaming toddler. Babies cry , some cry a lot and toddlers have screaming tantrums. I would be annoyed if I lived next to them though. Which makes me think the neighbour is more concerned about noise, if they were really concerned about abuse surely thet would report it to the council or police

Yes, I wondered about this, too.

elsien

numbercruncher8 said:

TBH I'd follow it up. You can't unhear things.

From the point of view of a potential victim, it doesn't matter how many reports, or who reports, just that it is done. The worst case scenario is that it was true, and both parties left it to each other to do something about it, arguing about responsibility.

Perhaps the tenant has ulterior motives, or perhaps they are deferred to you because they are inexperienced and haven't found themselves in this situation before. But in any case, they may know already that if the reports are false they will probably be known as the ones who called the authorities, so that in itself is a motivation to be sure of what they are saying.

Either way, it is better that the facts are established so that you know what was going on, and that any reporting is credible.

So sit down with them and elaborate on their suspicions. Ideally, some kind of diary of events with some attempted transcripts, or if it is particularly loud, even audio recordings may help. 

There isn't enough information in the OP for anyone to really make a judgement on anything else.

The OP sitting down with the suspicious neighbour and doing a diary is adding a completely unnecessary layer of complication. 

All OP needs to do is tell the neighbour how to report it if they have concerns, pass the information on themselves if they feel the need to, but signpost straight back to the neighbour and tell them they are doing that. 

It’s no more involved than that. Anything more means that they keep trying to drag the OP into the situation when he/she is at the end of the day just the landlord and it smacks of game playing by the neighbour otherwise. 

Aranyani

Call social services, pass on the concern, tell them where it came from. Why would you do anything other than that? 

The idea that you have to have your own children to recognise abuse or suffering in others is ridiculous by the way.

camden_kid

pinkshoes said:

It's how the whole safeguarding thing works.

One person notices something they think could be nothing, but reports it anyway, so it's on record. Maybe even years later another person finds something odd and reports it. If there is genuinely something wrong, a picture will then begin to form on record and it can be dealt with quickly due to lots of evidence.

If I were the tenant, I'd go round and ask the mum if she needed any help. If she then still has concerns then I would report it to social services.

I'm grateful I live in a detached house. My 4 year old we suspect has ADHD or similar, and his behaviour can be manic. He can go from happy to complete melt down over something we have no idea about. And OMG can he scream!! I'm sure I would be reported if I lived in a flat. I have been *that* parent who had to drag their child to school to make sure the other two got their on time.

I should of thought of that but who would of believed me?

numbercruncher8

elsien said:

numbercruncher8 said:

TBH I'd follow it up. You can't unhear things.

From the point of view of a potential victim, it doesn't matter how many reports, or who reports, just that it is done. The worst case scenario is that it was true, and both parties left it to each other to do something about it, arguing about responsibility.

Perhaps the tenant has ulterior motives, or perhaps they are deferred to you because they are inexperienced and haven't found themselves in this situation before. But in any case, they may know already that if the reports are false they will probably be known as the ones who called the authorities, so that in itself is a motivation to be sure of what they are saying.

Either way, it is better that the facts are established so that you know what was going on, and that any reporting is credible.

So sit down with them and elaborate on their suspicions. Ideally, some kind of diary of events with some attempted transcripts, or if it is particularly loud, even audio recordings may help. 

There isn't enough information in the OP for anyone to really make a judgement on anything else.

The OP sitting down with the suspicious neighbour and doing a diary is adding a completely unnecessary layer of complication. 

All OP needs to do is tell the neighbour how to report it if they have concerns, pass the information on themselves if they feel the need to, but signpost straight back to the neighbour and tell them they are doing that. 

It’s no more involved than that. Anything more means that they keep trying to drag the OP into the situation when he/she is at the end of the day just the landlord and it smacks of game playing by the neighbour otherwise. 

It's a simple conversation to have with them, not really anything complicated.

Don't know what's happened, but OP doubts the accuracy of the judgement of the tenant.

If they end up over-reacting and calling the authorities as the decision was left down to them, that's an issue that could end up having to be disclosed on selling. 

Seems a lot to risk for the sake of not asking the tenant a few questions to see what is going on.

Now, nobody knows what has happened because there is not enough detail. But if the tenant was correct in their assertions and it is a case of child abuse then keeping some details of what they are hearing and the times, could be useful at a later stage.

Not talking about from the point of view of landlord/tenant but from the potential victim. 

GDB2222

Hi, can I just say thanks for all the input. It's very helpful. 

I was round at the tenant's flat the other day, to sort out a problem. The child seemed perfectly happy and well cared for. I saw nothing to make me think anything was untoward. I'll keep as much of an eye on things as I can.