Paying Your Rent

When a Tenant misses a payment and falls behind with their rent the Council's Rent Recovery Team makes contact with them to find out what has happened and to make an arrangement to clear the arrears. When a Tenant falls behind with their rent and the arrears reach a serious level of over 6 to 8 weeks in arrears the Council's Tenancy Enforcement Officer gets involved and legal action is taken.

If you do not pay your rent on time we will contact you within 2 weeks of you falling into arrears to let you know that you have failed to pay your rent on time.

If you do get a communication about your arrears please act immediately and talk to us. We will want to make an arrangement with you to clear your arrears within an agreed period of time. If you make an arrangement to clear your arrears please stick to it.

Evictions

If a Tenant does not co-operate with us to clear their arrears they will leave us no choice but to issue a Notice of Seeking Possession. This legal Notice is very serious. If a Tenant still does not take steps to clear their arrears it allows us to take the case to Court. This means that you will have court costs to pay on top of the arrears you have accrued.

If you receive a Notice of Seeking Possession you should contact the Tenancy Enforcement Officer immediately on 01827 719312.   We will still consider making an arrangement to clear the arrears to prevent the matter being taken to Court.

After the Notice is served if you still have not contacted the Council or have failed to keep to agreed arrangements we will apply for a Court hearing. If you let things reach this stage, and a Court hearing is held, Court costs will be charged to the rent account making the debt even larger.

At the Court hearing the Judge will decide what happens next.   Even if the Judge agrees to suspend an order for possession on condition that you make agreed payments, you will have a County Court Judgement against you. This could affect your ability to obtain a mortgage, loan, hire purchase or even catalogue goods.

Don't let it get to this stage. Take the opportunity to talk to the Officer dealing with your case. Their name and number will be on the correspondence sent to you.

If your circumstances change let us know. It may be that your arrangement to clear your arrears needs to be re-assessed.

Complete your Housing Benefit forms as soon as you receive them and return them to the Council. If you fail to return these forms, or do not provide the information required, you might lose your benefit entitlement.

When a Tenant misses a payment and falls behind with their rent the Council's Rent Recovery Team makes contact with them to find out what has happened and to make an arrangement to clear the arrears. When a Tenant falls behind with their rent and the arrears reach a serious level of over 6 to 8 weeks in arrears the Council's Tenancy Enforcement Officer gets involved and legal action is taken.

If you do not pay your rent on time we will contact you within 2 weeks of you falling into arrears to let you know that you have failed to pay your rent on time.

If you do get a communication about your arrears please act immediately and talk to us. We will want to make an arrangement with you to clear your arrears within an agreed period of time. If you make an arrangement to clear your arrears please stick to it.