To worry about a social housing reference.

[babyapril]

I'm wondering if anyone has any idea please.
We've recently been offered a larger property, that we would like to accept. I had to run through a bunch of questions with the the new HA. They asked if we were in arrears with our current HA , l said we weren't. We were, though at one point this year about 5 months ago. It was when we were reliant on HB when l was out of work. This suddenly came back to me when l'd put the phone down. We have made a payment each week, and no longer struggle. The arrears lasted sometime &a they had to send me the initial proceedings of eviction. The new HA will talk to my HA this week. On paper we don't have any ' other issues, and have treated this house as our home & spent a fair bit of money on it.
Anyway, l'm worried now - that we could be turned down.

They asked if we were in arrears with our current HA
I would understand this question to mean that they were asking you if you are CURRENTLY in arrears in your HA.

So by answering NO you were truthful and completely correct.

You could have told them about the PAST ARREARS problem but I don't think that you were under any obligation to.

My Mum works for a HA and their policy is not to allow any exchanges or transfers whilst arrears are outstanding but usually if they can be settled the exchange or transfer can go ahead.

treated this house as our home & spent a fair bit of money on it
I don't actually understand what you mean here as you are supposed to treat the house as your home and the fact that you have spent money on it is kind of irrelevant.

Aside from that I think you are getting worried unnecessarily.

catlady all l meant was that we haven't destroyed it! and that hopefully that would be in our favour. Thank you for your helpful reassurance

all l meant was that we haven't destroyed it!
I see what you mean and yes although that is what you would expect from everybody it is amazing the number of SH tenants that don't look after their homes as well as you have.

With regards to the reference I am so sure that you have nothing to worry about.

In fact mother says that HB regularly do mess up payments for tenants and the fact that a tenant has had arrears that were outside of their control and made the effort to clear them as quickly as possible shows that they are conscientious tenants and the sort of people who are most likely to be granted their exchange or transfer.

Thanks again persian much appreciated. :)

The housing association where I work would ask if any current arrears or nosp, if there is a nosp due to previous but no current arrears it would generally be overlooked if satisfied with rest of answers received. Other questions would be any asb, history of alcohol/drug issues. Of course I can only speak for my organisation but I hope it will put your mind at rest a little. Good luck :)

Thank you flip what is a nosp?
I've been thinking... :)

I googled it - thank you. Some links say the HA could , but are understanding when it was a housing Benefit situation. I also saw some wanted 6 clear months. We sorted things out at the end of May.

Thanks again persian much appreciated
Anytime!!

Sorry I should have been clearer... in my experience the references take a while to attain. Why not call the ha and have a chat with an allocating officer to put your mind at rest? In my experience, 1 period of arrears, whilst out of work, now settled with no subsequent arrears would not prove an issue.

I used to work in housing (if it helps) and when we asked, we would only be interested in current arrears so a brief spell five months ago wouldn't be relevant.

It mainly comes from a financial management perspective e.g. Can you afford current rent on top of repayments for arrears etc but also (not relevant in your situation) because lots of HAs won't rehouse tenants (within their own stock) if they are already in arrears with the association.

I am a housing officer for a local authority and both provide references and ask for references in these circumstances.
I would be amazed if they turned you down on the basis of minor past arrears such as you've described. Our default question to ourselves tends to be: 'what would Shelter say if the tenant challenged the decision' and in this case, I think they'd recommend you were approved for the move.

Like a PP said, call the housing officer for a chat to put your mind at ease - they'll probably be able to give you an idea as to whether this is actually something you should be worrying about anyway.

Thank you all do much for the subsequent replies. It has helped. Ironically it was the HA that suggested that escalating it to a nosp would help the council hurry up and fix our claim. At that point , they had a back log of a few months!

I went through an exchange four years ago, and my account was at that point in arrears - because of a housing benefit cock up on their part. I wrote a strong letter of appeal, and within a week they had agreed and it all went through ok. Good luck!

Thank you pop
Hopefully it will all be okay.