General (main property discussion here) - Bad Debt

Hi, new to this chat stuff, but hoping someone can give me some advice. Had a tenant in our property who gave a months notice to quit, but moved out early in a hurry. Tenant was on benefits, so money stopped the day she went. Has given us no forwarding address, and has changed her mobile number - don't hold out any hope of recovering money she owes us, but are receiving lots of bills at the property for her, and DRU letters from various companies. Some of the bills are in her maiden name, with a differnt inital to hers! Anyway, what I would really like to know, is due to the bad debts at the address, will future tenants have problems getting credit etc, and if so can we get her bad debts removed from this address. Many thanks

Hi Gill, Under the Data Protection rules, companies have to show that there is a probable financial relationship between two people before they can link their credit histories together. An example of this would be a "new" tenant having a credit agreement in force at that address while the "old" tenant was still living there - this could be evidenced through the electoral roll or by other credit agreements which are in place. I suggest you get in touch (in writing) with the companies which are chasing her for money to inform them that she no longer lives there (giving them the last date at which she was definitely there). It may also be worth getting in touch with one of the credit reference agencies (e.g. Experian in Nottingham) to get their advice. I hope that helps. Best wishes. Clive

Hi Gill, Welcome to the forum. sorry to read about your bad tenant.Have you contacted the DSS about this person? Presumably she will be signing on wherever she goes next.They could track her that way,if they wanted to.Good luck.

Hi Gill,

I agree with Simon. In fact I had the same situation and I just wrote a standard reply to all the creditors returning their unopened letters.... Only one of them contacted me back on my mobile just to confirm... I also contacted the energy and water suppliers to make sure there was no issue for the new tenants. This method does cost you the postage (but is tax deductabel...). I also contacted the DSS: they did not want to know and tried to make me feel as if I was the criminal! At the very least they are obliged to make a note of the report... My reasons for doing all the above are all related to the fact that we as landlords face the constant hurdle of "the law on the side of the tenant...": our tax is also being missused by such people. Lastly and for my ex-tenant, he was just a small time criminal trying to use the address as a HQ for his varrious scams...

Best wishes, Regards, Malik

Gill

I think your real question here is whether the property and the person are linked and the bad debt from the person transfers to the property? The answer is no. Years ago a person doing this would be linked to the property, but that law changed back in the late 90's, so your new tenants won't have problems. I do agree with what action Malik took. You would be best to notify all the services yourself.

Gill

I think your real question here is whether the property and the person are linked and the bad debt from the person transfers to the property? The answer is no. Years ago a person doing this would be linked to the property, but that law changed back in the late 90's, so your new tenants won't have problems. I do agree with what action Malik took. You would be best to notify all the services yourself.