Updating post from Reddit.
Just need some reassurance if anyone has been in this situation!
We’re coming to the end of a very long eviction (section 21 was served in January 2024). Bailiffs are attending tomorrow to evict tenant but he (the tenant) has just been in contact with the agent claiming he never received the eviction notice. I’m assuming this is a lie, considering the eviction date is tomorrow (which he wouldn’t know without the notice) but conveniently contacted the agent the day before.
From my research the bailiffs will have some proof (recording maybe?) that they put the eviction notice in the tenants letter box.
I’m assuming/ hoping that the eviction will still go ahead tomorrow and this was just one last shot for him to stay but any reassurance would be great. Thank you!
have you ever watched "can't pay or we'll take it away" and the like on TV, not one of them ever have received the documentation... odd that!!
Courts and bailiffs would have been in contact and they won't turn up without the proper court orders etc.... they'll be going... get your locksmith on standby!
Great, thank you! Been on the phone to locksmith today confirming he’ll be there tomorrow so have that all sorted. I assume she’ll be evicted tomorrow but after such a long process (and multiple mess ups from the court along the way) I’m just on edge again. Thank you for your reassurance!
They broke so many laws on that show.
Went through the same almost 2 months ago. Your tenant is bs'ing you.
The bailiff will have given the notice 2 weeks ago and will be able to prove it. Let them do their thing tomorrow, have your locksmith ready to go and stay out of it as much as possible is my advice.
Chances are that the council will contact you (or, more likely, your agent) for a copy of the eviction notice as they won't house your soon-to-be-ex tenant without it.
What happens to soon to be evicted tenant if that eviction notice is not provided to the council and you don’t recognise the tenants name ?
Eventually the evicted tenant would be told to speak to the court to obtain a copy, at which point the council would resume the process. You might delay them being rehoused slightly, but that’s it.
What happens to you might be considerably worse. In the original post, tenant is claiming not to have received the notices. He might have knowledge of something that invalidates the S21 and instead of responding in court, decides to wait until eviction to claim the process is flawed, in an attempt to maximise the delay to landlord.
Tenant’s assertion would be extraordinary, probably reliant on unlikely accusations that you had intercepted the notices, or posed as them (or some other dishonest perversion of the eviction process, the sort that would mean the jackpot of illegal evictions if believed).
Getting yourself caught in such an easily provable lie, by claiming to the council that you don’t recognise the evicted tenant within days of serving an eviction notice on them? Man, you’d be gifting them something that would make their incredible claims look possible.
Good point. Probably best to not provide the notice and refuse to communicate with the council.
Don’t say anything that could incriminate yourself.
I've no idea.
Ah thank you so much for your comment. I’ll stay out of it as much as possible and let the bailiffs do their thing. Really appreciate your reassurance
Can you update tomorrow? Would like to know what happened.
Will do. Fingers crossed it all goes smoothly but I’ll let you know!
Same. Best of luck mate.
My local bailiffs would hand deliver their warrant and I always hand delivered a letter confirming the warrant date and time also, just to avoid this. I always wrote ‘hand delivered’ in big red letters on the envelope too. I don’t know if the bailiffs in your area do the same, but they are well used to dealing with this, so just get your locksmith arranged and let the bailiff deal with the tenant.
Great, I’m hoping that’s the case and it was hand delivered with proof. I’ll keep your method in mind if, god forbid, we ever have to deal with this again!
Just so you know - a hand delivered letter to an address is not legal service. You either need to get it in physically into there literal hands, or send it recorded delivery with royal mail. The bailiffs should be dealing with that for you though.
The hand delivered letter is to stop the tenant from pretending they know nothing about the pending eviction, I was one step ahead of them in that sense. But before the possession hearing, I always hand delivered my letters and completed a statement of truth for the court. These were always accepted by the judge along with my signed witness statement outlining the case facts.
Yeah, handing things to them is always the safest way.
If u have high court writ they will have to leave
>I’m assuming this is a lie
Why do you need to assume? There SHOULD be proof of delivery, have you asked whoever you made responsible to show you this, so that you aren't assuming?
My lawyer contacted me about this and sent over our notice of appointment (with bailiff) which I already received 6 weeks ago when the appointment was made. However she hasn’t been much help otherwise with providing proof that the tenant didn’t receive the notice. She said ‘from my understanding the bailiffs hand deliver the notice of eviction to the property’ and that ‘she hasn’t been contacted by the bailiffs to say there are any issues’.
So that’s essentially all I have to go off (that, and researching on the internet). I was just asking for any insight if anyone else has been in this situation.
>providing proof that the tenant didn’t receive the notice
It's not possible to prove a negative.
What you need is proof that it was delivered, not proof that it was not delivered.
Proof of delivery can be like postal services use, like GPS tracking and registry of location, or a photo of delivery.
I'd want either of these two options personally, but if there's a special service the bailiffs offer then I'd check what that is.
Yes, unfortunately my lawyer hasn’t been much help so I have just had to research online. I’m under the assumption that the bailiffs have a video of them hand delivering the letter to the tenants letter box. I have also been on the phone with the locksmith today (confirming tomorrow) who primarily does lock changes during eviction. From his understanding, the bailiffs will have video evidence of the delivery. I know this isn’t much help, however there is no phone number for the court bailiffs, only an email box which takes 10 working days for a reply. Considering the eviction is tomorrow morning I’m not sure what else to do except wait and hope the bailiffs are prepared for situations like this.
Doesn't matter what he claims at this point.
Why has it taken so long to get an eviction date, was it the courts being backed up or a complication with ending the tenancy itself?
We’re in London, so courts are massively backed up as it is.
3 months before the end of the tenant lease we let them know we didn’t want to renew, they said they don’t want to leave so we gave them S21 in Jan (for lease end date of April). They then became unemployed and went to universal credit and wanted council housing.
Courts finally saw to our application in June and told tenant to leave in early August. They didn’t leave so applied for warrant of possession straight away and heard nothing.
In October we found out the courts had misplaced our application and it had only just been put in the pile.
In January we sent a complaint to the courts to say it’s been 5 months and we don’t even have a date yet. Bailiffs got back to use a month later saying they had accidentally overlooked our application but we now have a date for April 2.
So, very long, frustrating process. Hoping tomorrow goes smoothly but the tenants claim today of not receiving the notice of eviction rattled me a bit, however the comments here have reassured me.
I hope everything goes well tomorrow for you.
What did it cost you for legal stuff for the whole process, if you don’t mind sharing?
About £1750 including lawyer costs. £4000 in rent arrears too because UC isn’t covering all the rent (which is already well below market rate), but I know people have lost a lot more on this sub so I’m grateful we’ve still been getting something each month
Once she is finally out, you can small claims for the outstanding rent with interest. Good luck for tomorrow!
Could have went with section 8 if they are more than 2 months behind as it would be auto approved with proof
Its non trivial if they are still paying something.
No section 8 is auto approved ?!
I work in social housing (similar but a bit different). However the bailiffs will have a copy of the order with them and unless you opted to serve yourself (which looking at your post doesn’t seem to be the case). The court will have said they have served.
Your tenants only option would be turn up at court tomorrow and plead with a circuit judge for a stay, of eviction that said it might be a court anywhere within the district that hears a case (for example I had a case in keighley West Yorkshire and the only sitting judge was in skipton North Yorkshire). A sob story to the bailiffs by the tenant won’t wash.
Thank you I appreciate your insight. We’ve done everything by the books and you’re correct in assuming we left the bailiffs to serve the notice. Hopefully everything goes smoothly tomorrow. Thanks again
Usual Excuse, they will be leaving tomorrow, nothing surer
That’s reassuring to hear, thank you!
Have they been paying rent for the past 12 months?
They’re on universal credit now which covers about 3/4 of the rent. Missing out on a bit each month which has added up to over 4 grand but still, better than what a lot of others receive on this sub.
I mean, I have never - never - seen it be successful, but failure of notice is a defense enforcement actually have to listen to on eviction day.
It could mean the bailiffs take longer than normal on site, as they would need to provide the proof of service for whatever step they say they were not served with.
Great thank you for your insight. Hopefully all goes well tomorrow 🤞🏻
I bet once your in there you will find a stack of letters too them about all unopened of course
Please update us
We were thinking that too, I guess we’ll see. I’ll let you know how it all goes tomorrow
Just posting so I can see the update as this seems interesting from a tenant aspect
God do you all hear yourselves. Landlords really are scum of the earth. Wishing bad things on you.
This is a community for Landlords. You can be anti-landlord in other places like /r/HousingUK/
Hopefully it blows up in your face, let's lynch the landlord heh