Ok, let me start by saying this isn't a manchild "help me OcUK, you're my only hope" thread. The first thing I'll be doing on my day off is heading to the letting agents in person and then the CAB if I get nowhere.
Basically my partner and I are moving in together. On roughly the 25th of August we went to a viewing at a nice little flat and decided to take it. We paid the retainer and were told we could move in on September 10th.
Over the next few days we went into the offices of the letting agent to fill out forms and provide references and such, this was all completed by the 27th or 28th.
Fast forward to yesterday and my partner popped into the office to pay our first month of rent and the deposit - she was told that neither of our references were complete as our employers hadn't responded so we couldn't proceed with the move.
This morning both my partner and I visited our respective HR departments and were told the same thing - the forms from the estate agents had only arrived today, posted yesterday.
Now I've just come off the phone with the lettings office (a surprisingly calm call considering how angry I am with them) who informed me that references take 7 working days to complete. This potentially pushes the move to next Saturday. "So what?" You may think, "a week isn't that big a deal", well the kicker is that the lettings agents told me that there'd be a £58 charge for each day past the 10th proceedings were delayed.
So, my issues are:
As it stands now I'll be speaking to them in person, refusing to even consider paying any late fees they have forced us to incur and hopefully getting the £150 reference checking fee removed.
So good people of OcUK, any thoughts, advice or experience of matters such as this?
Basically my partner and I are moving in together. On roughly the 25th of August we went to a viewing at a nice little flat and decided to take it. We paid the retainer and were told we could move in on September 10th.
Over the next few days we went into the offices of the letting agent to fill out forms and provide references and such, this was all completed by the 27th or 28th.
Fast forward to yesterday and my partner popped into the office to pay our first month of rent and the deposit - she was told that neither of our references were complete as our employers hadn't responded so we couldn't proceed with the move.
This morning both my partner and I visited our respective HR departments and were told the same thing - the forms from the estate agents had only arrived today, posted yesterday.
Now I've just come off the phone with the lettings office (a surprisingly calm call considering how angry I am with them) who informed me that references take 7 working days to complete. This potentially pushes the move to next Saturday. "So what?" You may think, "a week isn't that big a deal", well the kicker is that the lettings agents told me that there'd be a £58 charge for each day past the 10th proceedings were delayed.
So, my issues are:
- We gave them almost 2 weeks to get our references, they only started trying to contact them yesterday.
- They've already had the cheek of charging £150 for reference checks, a task which they have failed miserably at completing.
- Both my partner and I have taken a weekend off work for nothing.
- They forced our moving date back, which is annoying when we both work odd hours.
- And finally, they want to charge us £406 for this service in late moving fees.
As it stands now I'll be speaking to them in person, refusing to even consider paying any late fees they have forced us to incur and hopefully getting the £150 reference checking fee removed.
So good people of OcUK, any thoughts, advice or experience of matters such as this?
