Problem neighbour

Phirefly

Apologies if i'm going over old ground but as this is usually outside my sphere of interest, I usually pass over threads regarding this issue.

My best chum has an AST with his partner on a nice house in a nice area. They're happy and settled there, but their semi-detached neighbour has become more and more of a nuisance.

Obviously, I see it from my chums point of view, but in this instance its pretty clear cut.

In short, their neighbour is living in that house which he owns while he serves his court order for physically abusing his wife who lives over the road (nowt as queer, eh?) Primarily the problem is noise, he gets drunk almost every night and plays his TV at full volume all night. He had the cheek to threaten my friends with legal action as he claimed that the shrubs in their garden were damaging his fence. The other night when my mild-mannered (female) friend went round to ask him to turn the volume down, he boasted about his court order and behaved in a very threatening way. Theres several more incidents along these lines that I shan't bore you with here.

They contacted their landlady in the first instance who used to live in their house for some advice/her opinion, but she was dismissive. They've tried to catch him when he's sober and reason with him, but he's unresponsive. They are now keeping a diary of events.

I said to them that at least they're renting and aren't stuck with having bought the place. Apart from this neighbour, their home suits them in every way, and its a shame they could be forced to undergo an upheaval or be out of pocket just because of one nasty individual. I guess theres not a great deal they can do, I was thinking perhaps as hes already under a court order, they may have more response from the police should his behaviour worsen?

Any advice?

sooz

tell your friend to call environmental health dept of his council. They have a noise team who deal with this sort of thing.

He should keep detailed notes (ask the dept for some blank forms so he keeps this in the format they want) and each and every time the neighbour causes him a disturbance to call them. They will have an out hours number, and you have to leave a message, and they normally try to come over within the hour to witness the problem.

Then the council can take further action.

If he threatens them at all, they should call the police.

PasturesNew

Yeah, what sooz said.

It's a pain and everything and maybe Environmental won't come out when he's noisy (on answerphone out of office hours). And maybe the police won't come out if he's just looked at her a bit scarily. But the diary should be kept because it's not something you can create retrospecitvely in 3 months' time when the behaviour has escalated to pure madness and hell.

I'd let the landlady know too. If complaints are put in then it would go against her house if she sells in the future.

People are really quite powerless when it comes down to bad neighbours. The bad neighbours' attitude is always "live and let live", not realising that they are the ones not allowing it. And as he owns the property, it's very much "an Englishman's home is his castle" from his perspective. He won't give a monkey's gonad about your friend or any nuisance he's causing. In fact if she knocked on his door (I wouldn't) then he'd probably see HER as the nuisance.

Crazy, unfair society we live in.

Good luck!

sooz

PasturesNew wrote: »

It's a pain and everything and maybe Environmental won't come out when he's noisy (on answerphone out of office hours). And maybe the police won't come out if he's just looked at her a bit scarily. But the diary should be kept because it's not something you can create retrospecitvely in 3 months' time when the behaviour has escalated to pure madness and hell.

The thing with environmental health is to keep complaining. I have just gone through this for the second time (we have had trouble with local businesses in 2 different places, and have now got noise abatement orders against both).

We wasted so much time and energy complaining to EH in the wrong way. :mad: Not that they tell you what the right way is, as this leads to them having to do more work.

Call once, get a reference number, & the name of the person in charge of your case (or go straight for head of dept). Get the forms sent out to you asap.

Then call every single time the neighbour causes a nuisance. Leave a message every time. No-one answers after office hours, but they are out on calls and do check the answerphone regularly. Quote your ref no, your address & problem. Tell them if you'd like a visit that night, or not. They then have to record that you have called. So do this even if you are going out, going to bed etc. If back you do want a visit & they haven't called you back within their target time (our council's is 45 mins) then call them back and leave another message.

If it is really noisy & your friends can be in for an EH visit, make sure that they leave on the message that the officers should bring their noise measuring equipement (can't think of the name of the machine right now ). Half the time we got them round, they didn't bring the machine as it was with the other officers, being calibrated, broken etc :mad:

After 3 weeks of 3 calls per night, 2 during the day to complain about the previous night , 17 visits at 10.30pm & 15 pages of filled in diary note forms, my local EH finally start to take notice & took action for me.

You need to be persistant.

Phirefly

Excellent advice, as expected. Thanks team

Phirefly

sooz wrote: »

my local EH finally start to take notice & took action for me.

Out of interest, what action are they able to take?

sooz

nearly forgot - in the diary notes they should be really specific. If it's TV noise, note which programme & keep a copy of that night's tv schedule.

Phirefly

sooz wrote: »

nearly forgot - in the diary notes they should be really specific. If it's TV noise, note which programme & keep a copy of that night's tv schedule.

Heheh good advice, but they dont list the Gujarati channels he watches in the RT - perhaps he's doing it on purpose so they can't make detailed notes!

sooz

Phirefly wrote: »

Out of interest, what action are they able to take?

in my case it was against businesses, but first they approached the owners directly (ignored), then served a notice to do works (ignored), took them to court & won, & the judge issued a noise abatement order, fined them (incl council costs), & made them remove the offending equipement that was causing the noise. If they breach the order, it is straight back to court.

I understand they can seize equipment (eg stereos & tvs) too.

this link has some more info (don't know which council they are in so picked a random one)

PasturesNew

sooz wrote: »

noise measuring equipement (can't think of the name of the machine right now )

c*ntometer or ar5eometer

Phirefly

sooz wrote: »

in my case it was against businesses, but first they approached the owners directly (ignored), then served a notice to do works (ignored), took them to court & won, & the judge issued a noise abatement order, fined them (incl council costs), & made them remove the offending equipement that was causing the noise. If they breach the order, it is straight back to court.

I understand they can seize equipment (eg stereos & tvs) too.

this link has some more info (don't know which council they are in so picked a random one)

Excellent, that sounds promising. Hopefully with his existing court order, the threat of this kind of action could be a real trump card.

I'm coming across the caring pal, but its all selfish really - they're my best friends and favourite cheese evening companions and if the situation doesn't improve, they're threatening to move away