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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Do I Report Her?

77 replies

CloseToTheEdge17 · 28/12/2017 12:42

DH's EXW recently got a council house, and she asked DH to write a letter stating that we share custody of their daughter so that she could get a 3 bed.

DSD(17) actually lives with us full time (she was supposed to be staying at her mum's a few nights a week), but she now rarely sees her mum and her mum is refusing to let her live there at all stating its too disruptive for her DS(7) (she's just split from his dad). She doesn't even have a bed for DSD to sleep in on the rare occasion she does stay the night.

Am I wrong in wanting to report her for lying to the council to get a bigger house? I'm so cross that she's lied on her housing application and has been given a 3 bed house yet refuses to let DSD live there!

OP posts:
Original poster
CloseToTheEdge17 · 28/12/2017 13:00

No Miss she asked for the letter so our local council would let her rent a 3 bedroom house, which she got but is now refusing to furnish the 3rd bedroom for her DD's use. I don't know what the application asks as we rent privately (not sure we'd be eligible for a council house, then again I'm not sure why she is either tbh).

I know I won't end up saying anything, I'll just sit back and watch her alienate her DD more and more to the point when she'll just stop seeing her altogether Sad

OP posts:
Original poster
CloseToTheEdge17 · 28/12/2017 13:01

That's what makes me so annoyed Eat

I don't even know how she got a council house in the first place , she's on about £28k a year so I wouldn't have thought she'd be eligible?

OP posts:
Hotpinkangel19 · 28/12/2017 13:04

You don't have an income limit for a council house... if she pays her rent she's entitled to have one. She must have needed one at the time.

Shockedshell · 28/12/2017 13:06

In this day and age with the shortage of affordable and social housing it's very unusual for a council to allocate a bedroom for a child that the tenant isn't in receipt of Child Benefit or Child Tax Credits for. Certainly the Local Authority that I work for won't entertain allocating a bedroom if the tenant isn't the parent in receipt of benefits for the child.
Also, this would be setting those people reliant on benefits to struggle from the start if they had what would be classed as a spare bedroom for benefit purposes.

froshiechipandbrickie · 28/12/2017 13:07

She sounds awful.

But I don’t think that reporting her would improve the situation. She’d still be in the house and you’d have stirred up a lot of negative feelings. Would that actually help your DSD?

Also... it might sound harsh, but do you actually want DSD in that house? Where she’s so clearly unwanted?

k2p2k2tog · 28/12/2017 13:11

she asked DH to write a letter stating that we share custody of their daughter so that she could get a 3 bed.

So your DH is complicit in her lies and fraud.

WorraLiberty · 28/12/2017 13:12

You can say what you want but they're not going to down-size her to a 2 bedroom house, on the strength of 'tittle tattle' (which is how they'll see it).

Too much hassle for the council and anyway, things could change at any time.

cdtaylornats · 28/12/2017 13:25

Report her - there are people who need a 3 bedroom council house.

Bellamuerte · 28/12/2017 13:26

I'd report her anonymously because I'd be annoyed by the blatant fraud. The council will investigate and will either tax the extra bedroom or tell her to move. Although I wouldn't have let my OH write a letter full of lies in the first place!

stitchglitched · 28/12/2017 13:31

She will be paying the full rent anyway on a salary of 28k so the bedroom tax is irrelevant.

Gemini69 · 28/12/2017 13:31

Report her OP... Flowers

Snowman123 · 28/12/2017 13:32

Did DH write the letter? If so, are you reporting him too?
The best outcome is that your step daughter and her mum reconcile and she starts to use that spare room.
Your energy would be better supporting your stepdaughter, instead of trying to get one up on her Mum by reporting her to the council which will inevitably backfire on you.

Gemini69 · 28/12/2017 13:36

Rubbish..

Report her OP...

ShiftyMcGifty · 28/12/2017 13:37

“Not your circus, not your monkeys.”

Except it is.

And it’s all of our “monkeys” when someone commits fraud.

mustbemad17 · 28/12/2017 13:40

This annoys me so much. I watched my friend be plagued by SS for 'overcrowding' because there were 7 of them in a 2 bed flat...whilst the council told her she wasn't overcrowded & she wasn't entitled to even a 3 bed. But this woman has basically lied to get a bigger house!

Your DP was a moron for writing that letter, sorry. He has basically aided her in lying to the council.

Personally i'd report her regardless. And hope that if she is on HB they tax that extra room and if she is claiming as a single adult, that her seemingly regular visitor is also picked up on!

purplecorkheart · 28/12/2017 13:41

You DH needs to write a letter to the Council updating circumstances stating his daughter no longer resides in the house.

Oldraver · 28/12/2017 13:47

I think you will look vindictive if you report her. All she will say is that at the time of the application, that her Dad supported, she was entitled to a three bed. The council wont make her move now she is there..

crunchymint · 28/12/2017 13:48

When asked to write official letters, you state the truth. That would have avoided all of this. You did not have shared custody at the time, yet your DH wrote that you did.

Rubies12345 · 28/12/2017 13:50

I wonder if she's claiming CTC/CB for her and HB. If she is it's benefit fraud

BitOutOfPractice · 28/12/2017 13:50

Why did your dh write the letter? He's totally complicit in this fraud

Original poster
CloseToTheEdge17 · 28/12/2017 13:56

I don't know if the letter stated we did have shared custody or that we would have if she were to get a 3 bed house?

DH isn't one for lying and certainly not to help his EXW

It's a fucked up situation all round really and I don't suppose reporting her will accomplish much. She actually works for the council, which makes it worse IMO - but given that I have no idea what criteria need to be met to obtain a council house, I guess I'll just have to quietly seethe and hope karma notices her.

Thanks for all your responses, I will concentrate on making sure DSD knows she always has a home with us

OP posts:
ilovebattenberg · 28/12/2017 13:58

Yes definitely report. She has stopped another family who actually need a 3 bedroom house from having one and that is called fraud.

IrkThePurist · 28/12/2017 13:59

Your DP will also be found guilty of fraud for writing the letter.

If your DSD is 17, she wont be living at home much longer in the Councils eyes anyway, and she will have to pay bedroom tax on the third room. She could arrange for an exchange to a 2 bed but they aren't very common.
My advice to you is to let it go.

lalalalyra · 28/12/2017 14:02

Bedroom tax is irrelevant if she works and pays the rent.

I get why you want to report her, but honestly what will it achieve? She will simply say that her DD has moved out. They won't make her leave the 3 bedroom house. She won't lose her job. It'll do nothing except make the situation between you all more awkward.

ilovebattenberg · 28/12/2017 14:03

I wonder if she got the house fraudulently if she works for the council? I know of someone who did this and they got evicted but was many years ago now.

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