I’ll try to be as brief as possible but please bear with.
My downstairs neighbours have been making vexatious noise complaints about me to the council.
Background
Last year a notice appeared in our hallway asking residents to please be mindful of noise. I went down to speak to my downstairs neighbour to make sure it wasn’t anything I was doing that was causing the noise. They said, yes, it was they who’d put it up, and that there was a tumble drier making a noise. I said it was probably mine and we agreed a time when it would be switched off in the evening. I recorded the conversation and stuck to the agreement on the couple of days each week that I used my drier.
Fast forward a couple of months and I get a knock on my door from the council. Apparently a noise complaint was made about me using a tumble drier late at night every night. I told them that this wasn’t the case, I certainly don’t use it every night and that I had stuck to the agreement made about when it should go off. They seemed happy enough and went away. I then went down to talk to the neighbour again to ask them why they’d made a complaint when we’d agreed and I’d stuck to it. They said they hadn’t made a complaint to the council they’d complained to the letting agent and it was ages ago. Again I recorded it on my phone. I was a bit confused but let it drop but I told them as before that if they had an issue to please come and discuss it with me.
Fast forward to today and I get a telephone call from the council again. Another noise complaint has been made about me, this time about me playing a musical instrument 8constantly* between the hours of 10am and 6pm. Well yes, I do play the saxophone, but I practice for about 30 minutes up to three times a day, certainly only in the day and not every day. I told the council man this and he seemed happy enough and said they’d close. I mentioned the previous complaint and he wasn’t aware of it.
I went down to speak to my neighbour again, again I recorded it on my phone. They said they didn’t make an official complaint but that the council had called them today to ask whether their previous noise complaint about the tumble drier had been resolved. This is the previous complaint they denied making remember. they said they only mentioned the saxophone in passing but it definitely wasn’t an official complaint, and that the council had definitely only called today to ask about the previous complaint they’d made. During the conversation neighbour went from them saying they told the council I play a saxophone sometimes to them telling the council I play it constantly. I knew they were lying but again reminded them that if there was a problem, come and speak to me.
I called the council man back and asked if the council would call and ask a complainant about a previous complaint. he said that they definitely would not unless a notice had been served. He couldn’t confirm who had made the complaint but he checked back about the last complaint and said it was closed 5 days after it was made with no further action, in fact it was nowhere near the threshold for further action. He said he had called the complainant about the current complaint about the saxophone today and that the complaint had been lodged last friday. I asked if there was any channel I could go through to report vexatious complaints and he said that the only way was to report it to the police for harassment.
So neighbour is telling big fat porkies and I have it on recording. They are making vexatious complaints about me, for what reason I don’t know. I called 101 but was told it’s not a police matter, so no help there.
What can I do about this? It’s making me feel unwelcome, stressed and fearful in my own home.