Thread 3 - TalkExiles: "The Planet Goes On Being Round"

[Kucingsparkles]

Continuation of previous lifeboat threads 1 and 2.

Gather here all ye refugees from the JTT Flat Earth Society, welcome to the reassuringly oblate spheroid of MN! Ye all already know the answers to the questions "How the heck do I format my post?" "Why can't I edit my typos?" "What do those acronyms mean?" and most importantly, "Where is everybody that I used to know?"

So really we're all here just to chat randomly.

Argh the @ didn’t work. @Ginmonkeyagain

Enjoying this thread; my rough count suggests Hark! The Herald Angels Sing is some way ahead.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/christmas/4703091-what-is-your-favourite-carol?

So is this a cupboard with all the meters for your floor in it? There are two risks here - using it to store stuff and the padlock. It should be locked with a fire brigade key. The padlock is completely unacceptable, it should be locked with a fire brigade key.

His email is awful, I don't understand the point about membership. A RTM company should be managing on behalf of all leaseholders and a director of the RTM company should definitely not be abusing their position by comandeering communal property to store personal items.

I would specifically note you are raising it as a fire safety risk.

Do you have proper managing agents? We own the freehold and have a manegement company that is owned abs run by directors (all leaseholders can stand to be directors) but we employ a professional property management company to carry out the day to day management of the building and advise on legal issues.

If they don't for a block of 80 flats they are fools.

@Ginmonkeyagain it’s an actual little building erected against the bedrooms of one part of the block housing 19 meters. The building itself is accessed with a key we all hold, but literally half of the building is taken up by his makeshift cupboard which has been filled to the brim of junk (including very flammable items) and padlocked. In addition to this he’s placing things directly in front and on top of my meter, including flammable rubbish like polystyrene.

His point about membership was presumably a dig at me for not being a member (even though I don’t have to be), and asking me to visit CH website for the address was just pathetic.

We do have a managing agent but when I took this to them they said there wasn’t anything they could do as they act on behalf of him, and merely forwarded my emails directly to him.

Hmm - the he is right that ultimately decisions are made by the directors of the company but they should be advising the directors that this is not really an acceptable situation. If one person is allowed to use a communal cupboard for storage, why not everyone - this guy has effectively stolen floor space form the freeholder for his own personal use. It could be it is used to store communal items - we have a cupboard our caretaker uses to store cleaning stuff and we sometimes use it for temporary storage of building materials etc.. but it should definitely not be in the meter cupboard. He sounds like a right prick - you weren't making a suggesting you were raising fire safety concerns about the building.

I would go down the pass agg route. Contact your energy company saying you are really concerned about a situation that is preventing your from accessing your meter and is a potential fire risk and you have tried to raise it with the building management but nothing has been done.

Thanks gin. I’ll write to the energy company and freeholder, and include some photos.

This is why I share your concerns about RTM. We have done a lot of work (much of it before my time) to undo the type of toxic situation you describe, where a small group of leaseholders thought that they could aggressively control money and interfere with the building themselves. We have remnants of this still, just week one of the elderly former directors thought it was reasonable to try and deal with a broken corridor light himself rather than call our managing agents (which have electrical contractors on account) he ended up creating a dangerous situation with a loose wire touching the metal wire basket!

@CyanCyan I have no expertise so can only offer sympathies with the utter shitshow with your block of flats.

@Ginmonkeyagain Yikes! I was surprised so many people signed up to it but he was very aggressive with his pitch. I didn’t know the man but had heard from a neighbour that he wasn’t very nice, I had no idea what experience he had of running a company (turns out none) and the block was already toxic. The previous setup wasn’t perfect but it was much better than this. I know many of us in our side of the building are unhappy but I’m not sure there’s any way back at this point. I’m just trying to hang on and ignore it as much as possible until I can move.

@Kucingsparkles thank you. Home is supposed to be a refuge from stress, not a cause of it! I’ll never live in a large block again.

Sympathies @CyanCyan but it does seem inevitable he will piss off more and. more people as time goes on, and hopefully the issue will resolve itself sooner rather tha later, and hopefully lessons will ne learned.

Maybe not possible for you, but when an organisation I was a member of was holding meetings in what I thought of as an unsafe place I called into the fire station and had a word with the Chief Fire Officer. He arranged an inspection. Problem solved. (I know the UK functions differently from small town Ireland - but firemen get twitchy around breaches of safety protocols).

Yes they do!

I don't have any cat pics at the moment, but here is a kitten playing with a potato:

Elderberry's suggestion of getting a fire officer to check this horrible man's cupboard sounds like a good idea. Hope it gets sorted, Cyan, he sounds utterly loathsome.

This leasing business sounds a nightmare! Some people do seem to take a malign pleasure out of behaving like arseholes, don't they?

GWS, poorly threadsters!

Hello thread!

So many poorly people - here and at my work, so far I haven't had any lurgies. Presumably it will happen when I have a week off at the end of next month.

Skittles shares the couch with me. I think it's because the colour matches her green eyes. Her sister Reese has amber eyes and usually sleeps on my husband's lap, but Skittles is very skittish (has been since kitten hood, and it's how she got her name). It took her twelve years to sit on my lap, and I'm still the only person she will be ok being very close to.

Cyan getting the fire brigade involved does sound like a good idea. He can't really argue with them and it will be dealt with legally, if he continues to flout their recommendation. Can you get some legal advice about his shed?

Thanks all, fire brigade does sound like a good idea. My neighbour and I are going to contact a solicitor in the new year. It does worry me how much of a liability is when it’s just below my bedroom window. Doesn’t bother him of course as his flat is miles away from it, not even connected to the same part of the building 🙄

Try the fire brigade first, before you start paying for legal advice. It might cut through the crap immediately without you having to put yourself forward. Just talk to whoever is on the reception desk in the fire station - if they can't help you you've lost nothing.

A couple of photographs and a sketch plan would be a help to you when you're explaining your worries.

The legal advice is for discussing general options going forward rather than the fire issue. Just had a look at the local fire brigade site and they offer free safety visits. Perfect! Thanks very much for the suggestion (can’t remember who suggested it first).

This seems like a lovely thread! Can anyone join?

OH has just taken a very pissed off looking cat off to the cattery for Christmas.
Our lovely friends usually come and feed him but they are also in the UK this year.

We are off to the UK tomorrow to spend Christmas with the children and grand children.

We had to abandon similar plans last Christmas at very short notice due to the Covid restrictions. I have only seen my grand children once this year.

Can't wait - just want to be there now!