Right to buy

m1allen

Applying to buy rented house. Our Local council landlord do not have historic details from previous 5 rented properties over a 26yrs period. Their right to buy discount offer of the number of years is only based at the current property No 6 of 24yrs, same council landlord. In order to cliam the full discount, how can we prove this to  them,  as they asking for old rents books as proof only, which have never been used for decades nor would anyone keep. 

marcia_

 Bank statements showing rent payments or contact the council for housing benefit statements if you claimed

m1allen

Paid cash at rent office and never had housing benefits Marcia.  I was thinking is there a website for tracking tenants history ie  for credit checks, behaviour, etc. Had a browse but just goes round in circles with info. Thanks in advance any useful info

marcia_

 No rent payments are not recorded on your credit file. 

 Put in a subject access request to the housing association. Ask for all data they hold about you. That should turn something up as i cant believe they just destroyed everything. 

https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/your-right-to-get-copies-of-your-data/

m1allen

Ano, we thought the same and when we pressed for why, they were quick to close the call down saying we would have to seek legal advice. Thanks for the link Marcia.

Norman_Castle

Would council tax records help?

LHCalc123

Are you saying you've been in your current property for 24 years? If so, you may already be hitting maximum discount as it is capped. 

m1allen

The max discount we can get is 50 yrs,  so need to prove other 26 yrs. Also they won't accept council tax or poll tax prior to that, which would have took us back to early 80's at least. Going down the access data request route 1st, but even then it seems they don't have to disclose info according to ICO site. Going to seek legal advice too, as the extra years missing may make it worth it.

user1977

What's their basis for saying they "won't accept" the evidence for earlier years?

I expect a court would decide on the balance of probabilities whether you were a council tenant at the relevant times/addresses, so if you can prove you were living in a house owned at the time by the council, and they have no evidence of anybody else being the tenant...what would you have been other than a council tenant?

m1allen

They would not say other than rent books only and when pressed were quick to end the call. It's funny how when we called them, they seem to know what we were going to query, so probably common practice. They are saying computers only go back that far,  24yr, which I know is not correct as systems started up late 80s and I know they need to keep paper records too before that. 

DE_612183

Computer systems would probably have changed over the years, and the amount of data that would have to have been migrated would get change each time - it's probably fair that if a system was changed in say 2000, then any data before 1996 would not have been migrated ( and for closed account - which is essentially what this is may not have been brought over at all ).

Can you prove residency via electoral register?