Issues with commercial landlord - advice

[unwashed potato!]

Having issues with our commerical landlord just going on a power trip at the moment but it's leading to further and further problems with him as he pushes more and more to the point I'm likely to say to hell with him and hand my notice.

To give some background.

About 1.5 years ago there was a small water leak with the cause unknown. We rent the upstairs of a building space and the leak was downstairs in space below us. We had no water in ours, however there is a giant water tank above our cupboards, and the pipes to all tenants units run through ours.

None the less, the blame unofficially seemed to be pointed to us but nothing came of it.

Since then I had worries of leaks etc, and one problem I saw was that the building had standard domestic style water fed radiators that were inactive (due to a change of the way it was heated), but they were set to forever auto fill, so should there be a leak, they'd never stop filling up.

I asked and got permission to remove these and stop the auto fill, so spent a week or so doing this at my own expense but to the benefit of all in the building.

Now about 2/3 months after that, there is a plastic water heater unit that the landlord installed in our space before we moved in. This heats up water similar to a kettle, and then feeds the hot water in the sink. We don't use it as it's rubbish, but it is there none the less.

That broke over night, the plastic gave way to the pressure that is in the pipes and flooded our area and that below.

We dealt it with and dried everything etc, made good a ceiling, however I wasn't sure who's to blame for this.

Naturally because we've done work on the radiators, people are quick to blame anyone who's had recently touched pipes, they must be the cause of a water leak issue.

Our contract states we maintain everything within our space, that's fine, however something that isn't fit for purpose breaking, that wasn't installed by us, I wasn't sure. We've been there many years, however I wonder if people's answers might be different if we'd been there just 12 months, or 1 month etc.

At the moment it's cost us to sort this and causing further issues with the landlord, however, it feels like perhaps an issue that's not really our fault at all, it just happened to be an item that's within our space.

 

[[FnG]magnolia]

I'm not joking when I ask: are you living in an office block?

 

[Nitefly]

You should read your lease - which should set out the responsibilities.

Conduits and plant that do not exclusively serve your premises are typically landlord’s fixture that are excluded from the demise (along with the structure).

The opposite is true: you are typically expected to keep and maintain conduits serving your premises exclusively in good condition. Both parties are then expected to insure their respective ‘parts’.

It’s typically ‘buyer beware’ with taking a commercial lease - with a commercial tenant being expected to survey before taking the property and also then being responsible for upkeep and maintenance as mentioned.

Your ability to convince the landlord to take some responsibility should be assessed considering the above. I expect that if you have been in occupation for several years, the landlord will lean on your expectation to keep the premises in good condition.

However, the landlord should potentially be able to recover costs via its insurance policy for the building - assuming that it has paid for the outlay… it would then be expected that you paid the excess.

In short: it’s best to substantially review the responsibilities and obligations before committing to pay out on anything / carrying out works. If the landlord is unreasonable in any regard, it’s a good reason to leave.

 

[Diddums]

How big is the office? Is it a little converted house kinda gig, or something bigger with communal plant?

If it's the latter then it's very likely that the pipes and rads have naff all to do with you beyond keeping them clean, and your landlord should carry out regular checks (this isn't a legal thing, just good practice).

If it's the former and you have a boiler in a cupboard or similar, then it could well be your responsibility. Ultimately the lease will detail all of this as explained by @Nitefly above.

Also post some pics of the rads and maybe some of the plant. If this auto-fill thing is what I think it is, it's actually a pressurization unit which will have a leak detection sensor built in and stop pressurizing the system if it sees no increase in pressure after x amount of minutes, so you may be worrying about nothing then.

If it's just a hose that's permanently open then just shut it, that should under absolutely no circumstances be left open unsupervised and your concerns are very much valid.

Give us some more context here, your description sucks

 

[unwashed potato!]

I'm not joking when I ask: are you living in an office block?

Nope

Conduits and plant that do not exclusively serve your premises are typically landlord’s fixture that are excluded from the demise (along with the structure).

The opposite is true: you are typically expected to keep and maintain conduits serving your premises exclusively in good condition. Both parties are then expected to insure their respective ‘parts’

OK makes sense.

How big is the office? Is it a little converted house kinda gig, or something bigger with communal plant

It's an industrial site. Our space is about 150m squared.

Also post some pics of the rads and maybe some of the plant. If this auto-fill thing is what I think it is,

They've all gone now in our space, and the rest arr all now empty. There was a tank up high that auto filled the radiators. Now gone any way. It was auto filling as when we tried to empty the radiators from the ground floor, everything filled up the next day and you could hear it refilling. None the less, that's now sorted and gone thankfully.