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Aibu Landlady and washing machine

19 replies

Firawla · 12/07/2011 14:06

We moved into a new flat nearly a month ago, and from the start the washing machine has not been working. Only got the chance to look at it a couple of days after moving and saw that the rubber ring thing is broken, so if used it would leak and the detergent drawer when I opened it, the drawer front fell off and when I managed to get the actual drawer open I found loads of mould growing inside it as powder and water had been left in there all mashed up (seems like had been there a long time, as was a lot of mould.)
Obviously this should have been seen by the inventory beforehand anyway, but the landlady had cancelled that as she had not moved her stuff out in time, even though we had paid £85 fee to the agent specifically for the inventory...

Straight away after we saw this we contacted landlady and told her about it, she said she will try to get it fixed but did seem quite half hearted so I already felt doubtful that she would sort it out. (About the mould she just said Oh i just used to use the detergent straight into the drum! as if it does not matter about mould being in the machine then!!!) So as we felt she is not looking too likely to get it sorted we did offer her the suggestion that we can just buy our own replacement one, and get rid of her old one but she said no no, she will fix it.

So we waited the next weds she said someone will come have a look, noone came. We went away for a few days and when we came back, still no progress, and no way of contacting her as she had gone to hawaii and has not given any phone # only an email address. So we contacted her mum which she had left as an emergency contact (although she had tried to ban us from speaking to her mum and likes to refer to her as her 'secretary' which I find quite rude, that's not a respectful way to refer to your mum, ffs!)

Her mum told us just buy a new machine and deduct it from the rent, as she understood its not reasonable to go without a machine for so long. Once we fwd the receipt to the landlady's email suddenly she got back into contact saying cancel the order, i will get it fixed, my secretary doesnt have authority to authorise purchases etc.. So we cancelled it accorcding to her request, and since then have waited in on 3 more days for repairmen to come and look at it, although noone has come. I actually don't believe she even contacted anyone to come on all of those days, and just told us to wait for the sake of it, as when we contacted the guy she told us she would be asking, he had not heard from her at all. She then had the cheek to say along the lines of 'he wont be doing it now, because you phoned him yourselves and i didnt give you permission to speak to him'

Now I have been waiting nearly a month with no useable washing machine, and we have clocked up £65 of launderette fees (no acknowledgement or apology for this from her at all, she just ignores all mention of it. quite rude imo as it is her fault!) and I think enough is enough so we have ordered a 2nd hand washing machine from our own money, as we feel like we almost could have paid for one with the money wasted on launderette, so sick of just throwing money down the drain. My machine will be delivered this evening and I am going to get her mouldy one removed as they will remove the old one for free and there is no space to have 2 machines (we gave her a few days notice of that and said she can either arrange someone to get it, or put it in the cellar of the property if she wants to keep it) however she keeps saying we are 'not allowed to remove her property' so if we dont want it she wants us to pay for storage for it and put it back at the end, despite that storage costs are extremely expensive and the value of the machine is probably £0 because normally people charge to remove junk anyway.

So I am just going to get rid of this mouldy machine, because I have had enough and need a working machine. We had said we would probably be happy to leave our new one at the end of the tenancy, depending how long we are here, or if not that then she can remove the value of old machine from deposit (although that will be very little tbh as it is not worth anything!) so I don't really see what her problem can be, however she is still insisting and making an issue of it. So Aibu to just get rid of it and get it over and done with.

I am due with dc3 in 1 month, who i have been told will be induced a little bit early so really just a few weeks, and also have a 18 months old and a 3 yr old, so obviously washing piles up quickly and it is a real pain not to have a machine. This landlady has no kids and tbh I dont think she is very much in touch with reality, as most people would understand the need for a working washing machine. She also had the cheek to say 'its not an emergency its just a high priority' - well if it takes a month to sort out priorities for her then I hate to see how she handles other things in her life!

She also refuses to give us her bank details to even pay the rent, keeps telling us to get it from the agency, even though the agents are not managing agents and generally she seems to want to make every little simple thing about 10x more difficult than necessary.

Sorry so long! I could rant about her more but then I don't think anyone is going to make it to the end...

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TartyMcFarty · 12/07/2011 14:15

I would be contacting the agents re your legal position over tenancy, as I would not be wanting to continue renting from such a twonk of a landlady. FWIW, we rent a property out and wouldn't dream of leaving a tenant without a working appliance if originally included in the agreement (ours was let unfurnished, but still ... )