Brighton

Brighton Solfed Housing Union: Deposit Theft

Deposits

In summary:

  • Your landlord must protect your deposit within 30 days of receiving it
  • They must provide you with a certificate for the protection of your deposit, as well as with information about the scheme they have protected it in
  • You have the right to edit the inventory for the property that you are provided with at the start of your tenancy
  • Deposit deductions can only be made to return the property to the condition it was in when you moved in

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Brighton Solfed Housing Union: Agency Fees

Agency Fees

In summary:

  • If you are signing a tenancy agreement on or after June 1st 2019, nearly all agency fees are banned (see below for details)
  • If you signed a tenancy agreement before June 1st 2019, your agency can charge you the fees included in that agreement up to May 31st 2020
  • Agency fees should be included in advertisements of properties for rent
  • Charges for the inventory should be split equally between tenants and landlords

Topic:

Does Brighton Council only care about PR?

UPDATE: since the publication of this article on the afternoon of Monday 10th July 2017, Larissa Reed, Executive Director for Neighbourhoods, Communities & Housing at Brighton council has been in touch to arrange a meeting with Brighton SolFed and the Bobby Carver campaign within the next two weeks. We look forward to hearing how the issues raised below are going to be addressed, and about the changes the council is going to put in place to ensure 'the safest homes possible' for everyone...

 

Agency fuckups: sometimes it's enough just to ask

A prospective tenant contacted Brighton SolFed after she was poorly treated by an agency. The list of grievances will be sadly familiar to anyone who has or does rent in Brighton. For example, after the agency had received the £840 fee for the four tenants moving into the house, they: changed the length of the agreement from twelve to eleven months; gave the tenants misleading information about insurance and tried to pressure them into more expensive agreements; made absurd requests for the paperwork required by their guarantor; added additional fees for this paperwork; forced expensive insurance schemes on international tenants; went back on a promise to fix up the bathroom; were generally unresponsive and misleading when they could be contacted, and moved the moving in date back whilst still expecting the tenants to pay rent from the first date.

Smiles, Solidarity and Ephesus

Our dispute with Ephesus has come to an end with a victory; the worker has been paid all that was owed.

Solidarity from many people has been the key to attaining this result.

From the outset the worker, who is also involved in the Spanish Marea Granate movement, wanted to find a way to collectivise the dispute and try to improve the conditions for their fellow workmates even though they were leaving. As the notice period finished, the worker asked for all their holiday pay and if they were going to receive the money owed for minimum wage. All they were offered was a measly £150. Management hoped this would keep the worker quiet.

We delivered the demand letter as a group, including the worker. We were received with smiles and “yes yes yes.”  We left and awaited their response; we gave them a week before the deadline was up.

Precarious Mayday marks the start of dispute with Ephesus restaurant

This year's mayday was celebrated in Brighton with the coming together of different local unions and groups organising against casualised working conditions and the housing crisis. The demo soon headed for a local restaurant that has been underpaying one of our members, and demanding they be paid. The protest marks the start of a dispute, continuing our efforts over the past few years of trying to bring International Workers Day back to its roots in worker militancy and anarchist labour organising.