UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hello everybody.
I have been a long time lurker to this site and gained lots of useful info but I have an issue of my own now and have decided to make it official in the hope someone can offer me some advice.

There is a suspicion shared  between myself, my letting agent and my gas engineers that my tenant is purposely interfering with the gas supply to try to make the boiler appear faulty.

She asked for a new one about 6 months but I refused as I and my engineer believe there is still plenty of life in the present one. She applied for new one under one of the various schemes but was refused as she had one fitted free at a previous property she rented. In the last fortnight she has reported a fault 5 times. 3 different engineers have been out to it and not one of them could find anything wrong. We now suspect she is turning the gas off until the boiler goes out, then turning it back on and reporting the boiler as faulty and unreliable in an attempt to justify a replacement. The boiler is about 12 years old and not the most efficient, I suspect the gas bills are catching up with her and she wants something cheaper to run. The tenant has been renting property for over 25 years and has demonstrated previously that she knows all the tricks and scams and I cant help thinking this is another one.

The engineers are trying to come up with a way of determining if the supply is being interrupted intentionally via the valve and if we can prove this she can be confronted but its proving difficult for safety reasons. Can anyone offer any help or advice on how to deal with this. A hidden camera has been suggested but I see this as last resort.

Cheers. MrB

I'd go with hidden camera. It's the only evidence I can think of that would be hard to deny.

"Via the valve" if you mean the gas cock then you slap a security sticker (signed) over the valve. Take photo.
The only way to turn it would be to damage the sticker (there are loads available).
If you really need to turn it an emergency then sticker won't prevent it.

However I think the tenant can effect the same symptoms without touching the gas cock by turning the boiler off from the controls?
You need to apply a sticker across the panel (if one) that leads to the controls and another to the power socket switch and yet another to the fuse box....

Or install the camera.

What makes you think it is the gas supply being disconnected.  Boilers do get intermittent faults.  Just curious.

Best of luck

If she is on a periodic tenancy I would issue Section 21 notice to quit.I would still follow the other suggestions to get evidence in case it comes to Section 8.To do something like this she must be more than just a crafty tenant,more of a nutjob.I would not sleep easy with someone like that in my property.

I dont think sticker or breakable ties on the main valve will do.  So what if it is broken, tenant could say they thought there was a smell of gas or whatever and had to turn it off.

You need something more reliable with date and time evidence.  A camera is your only option here, but I would take some advice first on data protection and privacy laws.

Be a shame to go to the expense of a section 8 to have your evidence thrown out for being illegally obtained.

I don't understand your logic Martha...
If the sticker won't work then why would the camera??? The tenant can still claim smell of gas in either case,...

The tenant isn't going to let a camera be installed ...privacy, harassment all manner of other issues abound...and of course you are calling the tenant a liar to their face...nice.

Forget the camera idea....non starter in my view.

I do sympathise with HKarma view...get rid of tenant before she blows up the house.

Quote from: theangrylandlord on February 08, 2016, 04:10:07 PM
I don't understand your logic Martha...
If the sticker won't work then why would the camera??? The tenant can still claim smell of gas in either case,...

The tenant isn't going to let a camera be installed ...privacy, harassment all manner of other issues abound...and of course you are calling the tenant a liar to their face...nice.

Forget the camera idea....non starter in my view.

I do sympathise with HKarma view...get rid of tenant before she blows up the house.

Simply because a camera will build up a catalogue of evidence.  A sticker will rip once - which tells you nothing.

However I accept that there are other issues to consider here, privacy being one.  A months camera footage is not going to be worth a jot in court if the tenant did not give permission for it to be installed in their home in the first place.

The OP specifically said "hidden camera"... we're not talking about the pragmatics of Court here, we're not talking about obtaining permission. We're talking about a hidden camera that will be used to satisfy - or debunk - the OP's suspicion that tampering is going on. If that's found to be the case, I think it'll be a simple case of a Section 21 - no reason given - for this Tenant. If the boiler is still playing-up and the hidden camera shows no tampering then a very different approach, obviously.

Quote from: Hippogriff on February 09, 2016, 09:53:18 AM
The OP specifically said "hidden camera"... we're not talking about the pragmatics of Court here, we're not talking about obtaining permission. We're talking about a hidden camera that will be used to satisfy - or debunk - the OP's suspicion that tampering is going on. If that's found to be the case, I think it'll be a simple case of a Section 21 - no reason given - for this Tenant. If the boiler is still playing-up and the hidden camera shows no tampering then a very different approach, obviously.

Yeah good point HG.  In that case I would skip all the intermediate stuff and head for section 21 anyway :-)

Hiya please can you help my tennents have been at my property now for 5 years with no problem,I've put in a section 21 for tennents to leave, a weeks later they kept on saying boiler not working when I would visit boiler was working,after I put section 21 in I completed a house  inspection I saw black marks on wall,so that same day  I wrote a letter (please tell me of any problem with house) section 21 as expired in January and we put in to the courts claim form for possession of property,now we have received A claim from tenant for injunction order requiring the landlord to do repairs and protection from harassment damages for breach of defenders obligations,this can be right can I  I thought before any form of action like this tenant would have to write to me about any problems and contact environmental health and the council, how can the County Court actually entertain this for direction if tenant as and followed procedure?

1 tenant write me letters

2  Should tenant contact council

3 should tenant contact environmental health

4 tenant reported problems to estate agent as well

Hmmm I suspect some trickery on part of tenant...
Before answering can you please clarify from whom did you receive the injunction notice?
Direct from tenant? From a solicitor acting for the tenant? Or a notice from the court that the tenant has lodged a defence?

Clearly your tenancy agreement started before Oct 1 2015 so need to know who is doing what....
The law is quite clear on the correct procedure which doesn't appear to apply here but it will be clearer once you clarify....