Not sure if this is in the right place! I'll try and make this as short as I can.
We live in courtyard. There are a few privately owned cottages, a row of terraced houses just outside of it and then a row of new build social houses. We live in one of the new builds. In front of our property, we have a driveway with space for two cars. Because it is a courtyard, we don't have any outside kerbs that extra cars can park along. There are a number of other parking spaces, however. Some of them are designated to the other houses in the courtyard that don't have drives. These are numbered (according to house number). There are also about 4-5 visitor spaces marked with a 'V'. When we moved in 2.5 years ago, we were told we could only use our driveway and visitor spaces and not the numbered residential spaces. We have done this the whole time we have lived here with no issue.
A few months ago, friends of mine were visiting. There wasn't enough room on the driveway so one of them parked in a visitor space. She had a few drinks and so didn't drive home. When she picked her car up the next day, she had a ticket on her windscreen off a private company to say she was being fined £100. We were all a bit confused. There was a new unlit sign that had been put up next to the residential spaces saying that only permit holders could park in residential spaces. It didn't say anything about the visitor spaces.
There is an old woman who lives in one of the terraced houses just outside the courtyard. She parks her car in the courtyard. She is a constant complainer, you probably know the type. Anyway, I believe she has an issue with there being social housing tenants living near her. I had zero doubt that it was her that had reported my friend's car. A week or so after this, I received a letter from our housing association saying a complaint had been made RE parking against our address. After speaking to them, they said that the person had complained about someone parking in a residential space which was not the case and that they did not see any issue with people using any spaces marked with a 'V'.
My suspicions about who made the complaint were confirmed about a month ago. My sister and her partner and baby moved in next door. Her partner temporarily parked his van in a visitor space while my parents had parked on their drive. I heard some hysterical screaming outside my house so I stood in my hallway to listen. The woman in question was stood outside my door, yelling at my sister and her partner (and my one-year old niece who was with them), threatening them. She had been out taking photos and videos of his van and said she was taking him to court.
She is not the land owner. She is just a resident who sees herself as the sheriff of the courtyard. Two days after Christmas, she had a traffic warden out shining torches into cars and writing tickets for any visitors that didn't have a permit (the residents have never had permits up until recently, we've looked at all of the cars and the permits start dates were the end of November this year). The thing is, she cannot physically see these spaces from her house, especially in the dark. She has to actually come out and patrol the courtyard checking up on people.
It also begs the question how she knew that the friend who parked in the visitor space overnight was at MY house. The only way she could have known this was if she was monitoring my house for 12+ hours. Again, she cannot see my house from hers.
I, and I know other HA residents, feel harassed by her. She watches our houses like Big Brother and she has no issue screaming and threatening residents even in front of their children. For this reason, I would not allow my daughter to play out in the front because I expect this woman would find some sort of nuisance with it and I don't doubt that she would happily confront my child, and having seen how aggressive she can be, I don't want my daughter being put in that situation.
I want to put in a complaint about her. About her surveilling our homes, for screaming and using threatening language towards residents. Even if nothing can actually be done about her, I want her to know that it is not acceptable to use such intimidating behaviour and language towards people. She has no good basis for it. There is absolutely nothing to say that we must not use visitor spaces and we have been told by numerous people that we are indeed allowed to use it. And even if there was, that absolutely does not warrant someone screaming in your face. We no longer use the visitor spaces, we have people park across the bottom of our drive if there are more than 2 cars. Unfortunately that makes it difficult for this woman to get down the road to her parking space but that's the only other place we can park if she says we cannot use the visitor spaces.
I just wondered what the best course of action would be RE reporting her harassing behaviour? I would assume the council but a few people have told me it would be a police matter. Her behaviour is threatening and causing distress but she isn't a physical danger so I'm not sure if that's the best way to go.
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17 replies
Bexicle22 · 02/01/2020 18:03
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