my friend/money help/wtc/rent etc

someonehadmyusername

my friend is single mum in council house and works part time

she gets approx £80 a week from work
approx £120 wtc/ctc
£17 child benefit

and that is all
when she moved into her house not long ago the council told her to pay £30 a week rent untill her rebate was sorted

so she did

they come back and said she has to pay full rent (£50 week) and full council tax (£95month)

but she had arrears of £300 because of only paying £30 week
they said this needs to be payed by nxt february and her total rent a week is now £70!!!

surely this cant be right can it?
x

martinpike

Sounds to me like her situation has been assessed and the rules say she can afford that much.

As for 'can it be right?', I'd say £70 a week rent (dropping to £50 when arrears cleared) for a house is quite cheap, although obviously I don't know where you live.

I assume there is some sort of appeals process she can follow?

As a single mum on benefits there's no doubt money will be tight, so I'd suggest you help her do a budget using information from this site, to avoid her slipping into debt.

someonehadmyusername

she already has £500 overdraft but is reducing it to £100

she has £500 credit card and £4000 bank loan

shes struggling

im going to help her do a budget next week

i thought she wouldnt have to pay full rent/council tax
its a lot to pull out on her own
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princessmoneysaver

Sadly in most cases of people having WTC & CTC full rent & council tax has to be paid, we get about £3 off a week when we were on that kind of wage but our rent was £55 so perhaps that is why? Now we have to pay it all but we get roughly £159 a week wage now.

Yvonne

stellagypsy

Re your friend's rent arrears - I have done rent arrears collection in my time and the rule of thumb we followed was that any arrangement we made with a tenant in arrears should be AFFORDABLE to them - £20 per week is ridiculous if that is her income, I would have accepted a DD for £5.00 per week, which is much more do-able. The trouble with unrealistic arrangements is that they pay for 2 or 3 weeks then they just can't afford it and it falls through. I liked nice sums that were easy to pay, and setting up a DD is perfect as the Council are assured their money and there are no slip ups.

Tell your friend to get CHAS* or similar involved asap and renegotiate the arrangement(s) she currently has. If she is having to pay Council Tax arrears too (they will also be after their pound of flesh), she will be feeling pretty miserable money-wise and CHAS can really help in multiple debt situations like this where there is a housing problem - SHE MUST DO IT NOW, if she leaves it, it will get WORSE.

(*CHAS = Catholic Housing, you do not have to be Catholic, they really are good with benefit problems and negotiating arrears agreements - they are in the phone book).

Also, FWIW, a Court wouldn't make an order for £20 per week on that wage, they would probabaly consider a fiver reasonable. Also, I woudn't put a case in Court for £300 rent arrears if it was being paid off regularly - the Judge would throw it out. However, Council Tax is another matter........keep them sweet at all costs.

HTH, Stella

someonehadmyusername

just been talking to her and she says she must pay £20 a week extra for arrears as she is an introductory tenant

is this right?
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bonnie_2

whats an introductory tennant new to me, we only had to pay £3 something of our rent arreas and we get £235 wages,£153 tax credit and £45 carers allowance and £37 child benifit this was set by springboard my rent is £93 per week.

someonehadmyusername

when you first take a council house up here, you are an introductory tenant for a year
so, your on a years trial really
you dont have the same rights as when you are a secure tenant

or something like that!
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Fran

She should visit CAB too! She needs to get help with her debts and of course needs to keep her house and being an introductory tenant as someone has already said gives you less rights. They will be able to help negotiate with the housing dept. if necessary and also do a benefit check to make sure she's getting all she should. She should be looking for these answers herself as you have your own things to sort out!

stellagypsy

At the end of the day, introductory tenant or not, they cannot get blood out of a stone and I would be very interested to hear what a Judge had to say to them for trying to extort that amount from her. She should go to CAB and / or stick to her guns and insist on £5.00 per week maximum.

We looked at introductory tenancies but decided not to bother. I still think it would be very difficult to get her out if they wanted to after the year was up.

Stella

Savvy_Sue

Agree with stellagypsy. I thought councils, HAs etc were being encouraged to help people establish SECURE tenancies, which would mean being more flexible rather than less as long as agreements are kept to. IE you don't dump someone in a first tenancy and leave them to it. You find out what help they need to make the tenancy work, and help them get that help.

They told her to pay £30 pw, she did, their advice was wrong. I agree a judge wouldn't make an order anything like that high.

An agreement is between two parties, I thought. So if she doesn't agree, they can't enforce it. Only if she says "OK I will pay that much" or a court says to her "You must pay that much" does an agreement exist.

I would suggest that she writes to say she is taking advice and until then she will pay arrears at £5 per week, because she cannot sustain any more than that. She MUST keep paying that £5 per week, come hell or high water. If she gets a work bonus or anything like that and has a bit spare one week, she should PUT THAT MONEY IN A VERY SAFE PLACE rather than paying a bit extra, ready for the week when she doesn't have that £5.

They can write back until they are blue in the face insisting that she pays more, they can say they will not give her a secure tenancy, they can threaten to evict her, but at the end of the day I don't see they will be able to evict her if she's paid that £5 every week, nor would it be in their best interests to do so because they would then only have to rehouse her because she has a young child!

I know it's terribly terribly stressful, but better to pay that £5 regularly than even try to pay more.

Shelter are another useful lot to contact!