PILC helps Social Tenants challenge unfair service charges

Last week PILC helped the Social Housing Action Campaign (SHAC) secure a meeting with the National Audit Office (NAO) who is also launching a preliminary investigation into the demands of the campaigners.

Guest Blog from SHAC activists

SHAC is a campaign group that links tenants, renters, shared owners, and leaseholders living in homes owned by housing association, council, and private landlords. They campaign to improve people’s housing conditions and to reduce the commercialisation of public housing. 

Earlier in March, together with PILC, they issued a dossier to the National Audit Office over systemic and widespread service charge abuses. The practices reported by SHAC’s members include inaccurate bills, overcharging and a failure to provide residents with supporting evidence of costs. Residents across Britain face a range of increasing and unclear charges, even in homes meant to be marketed as ‘affordable’ housing, with some paying up to £8,000 per year. 

The request to the NAO specifically asked it to investigate welfare benefits paid to landlords and managing agents to cover claimants’ service charges, with a focus on the role of the Department for Work and Pensions, who SHAC says is not using its powers to adequately scrutinise excessive and sometimes fictional service charges.  

Suzanne Muna from SHAC has said 

The benefits system currently offers landlords a blank cheque when it comes to service charges paid on behalf of claimants. There is no system in place to make sure that service charge demands are reasonable or even legitimate.  

Working with PILC, we have presented evidence of money flowing without scrutiny from the public purse straight into the pockets of landlords and managing agents.  

At a time when government is taking welfare support away from those on poverty wages, disabled people, and those without work, it is high time that they put an end to service charge malpractice, not just for those on benefits, but for everyone affected. 

As part of this submission to the NAO, SHAC reviewed 233 First Tier Tribunal (FTT) judgements involving tenants or residents’ level, or payability, of service charges during 2024 where an outcome had been reached. In 72% of those cases, the FTT removed or reduced the disputed charges, as Inside Housing reports.

Working with SHAC, twenty-six MPs signed a letter asking the NAO to investigate payments in respect of service charges, which was submitted with this request. With the letter and a bundle of evidence compiled by SHAC and PILC, the NAO was given a formal challenge to the lack of action to ensure public funds are being spent on reasonable and legitimately incurred charges.

To support the campaign, a Parliamentary petition was launched by SHAC demanding government action on service charge abuse which has reached almost 6,000 signatures. The action has also generated widespread media interest including articles in The Observer, the MailOnline, and a report on BBC Morning Live. 

The NAO replied to the campaigners agreeing to a meeting and scoping towards an investigation.  

Last week the campaign was mentioned on BBC Morning Live:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsBW7zYZLMY

Watch this space for further updates.  

Sign the petition to stop service charge abuse here. 

This work is part of PILC’s Gentrification Project: Supporting access to justice in the class-based transformation of urban space.  Find out more about the project here.