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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Which neighbour is being unreasonable?

242 replies

Neighbourshateeachother · 15/08/2021 18:46

Neighbour A runs (ran) a small online business from home (pre pandemic). During the lockdown as more people were buying online business went up. Due to nature of the business a large lorry would visit neighbour A weekly to deliver stock and sometimes Ups / DHL would make visits to collect / deliver.

Neighbour B has young children and likes them to play outside and didn’t didn’t like the ‘busyness’ of the street which is a nice quiet cul de sac. Neighbour B reported neighbour A to the council and got the business shut down.

Neighbour A found out neighbour B was responsible for this and told everyone in the street both in person and on the street WhatsApp chat.

Other residents of the street now feel awkward. Who IBU neighbour A or B?

OP posts:
JesusIsAnyNameFree · 15/08/2021 23:16

@Neighbourshateeachother

Council said it was fine to run a business as long as it wasn’t an inconvenience to other residents. Neighbour B found it an inconvenience and pursued complaints until action was taken.
OK, so neighbour B is an absolute cunt.
memberofthewedding · 16/08/2021 00:33

There is an entire unrevealed back story here.

There are probably thousands of small Ebay and Amazon sellers running a business from home and their neighbours dont even know it.

A few years back a close neighbour was fixing up cars (on their driveway) and selling them. Obviously it did cause an inconvenience to others because of the constant arrivals and departures of "customers" and the revving of engines, combined with the constant banging, hammering and other industrial noises. Someone (not me) reported them and the y were visited by officials from the planning department. It was a clear inconvenience and change of use. The family sold the house and left.

The new owners let it out via the room and then submitted plans to turn it into a much larger HMO. There were multiple objections and planning permission was twice refused. The house is again on the market.

DeflatedGinDrinker · 16/08/2021 01:01

Neighbour B is definitely unreasonable!

AlexandraQueen · 16/08/2021 01:19

Neighbour B is U. Especially during covid, it wouldn't be that easy for A to suddenly find a premises. We were all told to work from home, that's what A was doing. And the rise in business was due to online order, A has know way off knowing if that would continue once things were back to normal.

Gingerkittykat · 16/08/2021 02:03

It's impossible to say if B was wrong for reporting, was there any other noise? Were the lorries blocking the street? How many delivery vans were there?

A was definitely acting spitefully by telling all of the neighbours.

Are you team A or B, OP?

Sadiecow · 16/08/2021 06:09

B is unreasonable!

Balonzette · 16/08/2021 06:14

Neighbour B is horrible. What a spiteful thing to do.

sandgrown · 16/08/2021 06:46

I live in a cul de sac . My neighbour sells quad bikes so regularly revs them and drives them up and down at speed . His mates / customers block the road with vans but he is also the one who lets his feral child play in the street . There are sometimes about a dozen children running round the street ( they don’t all live there ) and playing on bikes and scooters until 10pm . None of them appear to have any road sense and it makes driving in and out very difficult. A child ran out from behind a van in front of me . Luckily I was driving very slowly but the parents who were sat out “watching “ gave me a mouthful of abuse. I used to have a neighbour who was a magistrate and serial complainer but at least the street was clean, tidy and quiet .

liveforsummer · 16/08/2021 07:20

Nobody here would bat an eyelid let alone complain to the council or expect the council to act on it. To make a difference to the traffic, noise and nuisance level, what would it do - ban all those residents from ordering groceries and the companies from delivering?

You're lucky to have good neighbours. We are in block of floor flats and my neighbours in the opposite block would absolutely complain. One persistent person can be more effective that 10 half hearted complaints. Funnily enough they are the ones that actually break all the street rules. The gardens are all communal and should be walk through but they have commandeered their own back and fronts by planting hedges to separate, putting up sheds and washing lines (neither allowed) digging up communal lawn to make flower beds etc. If dc step on the grass outside their front window they bang in the glass to make them move. They'd absolutely complain about deliveries like that if they knew someone was actually earning money from it just because they could. It's hard to know if B is this type of neighbours from what is written or if A really was causing a nuisance, but I do suspect the former.

Cuddlyrottweiler · 16/08/2021 07:32

A. Clearly there's more to the story. One lorry a week is no more inconvenient that a weekly tesco delivery. A business wouldn't get shut down for that.

Binnaggy · 16/08/2021 07:51

This reply has been deleted

Withdrawn at the user's request

copernicium · 16/08/2021 07:55

During the height of lockdown, I was having deliveries most days. My neighbour reported me several times to the council.

tintodeverano2 · 16/08/2021 07:56

Does neighbour B not have a garden? The road is for cars, not children.

2bazookas · 16/08/2021 08:05

A.

Obviously6 its a residential area and they did not have a permit to run a business from it.. for exactly the reasons neighbour B complained of.

It also means B was cheating on their council tax rate, paying domestic not business rate

Thehop · 16/08/2021 08:08

Neighbour b was a nob.

MaMelon · 16/08/2021 08:14

Any further info Neighbourshateeachother?

HappyRaven · 16/08/2021 08:15

I think there must be more to it than you have said. I don't think I would notice 1 lorry and a few delivery vans a week.

I think A is unreasonable telling all the neighbours on B. What do they want to gain from this? Do they want the street to bully and isolate B? Nasty behaviour.

TheGenealogist · 16/08/2021 08:18

@IveGotASongThatllGetOnYNerves

Meant to say, I have an Etsy shop and work entirely from home. My bedroom is also my work space. You can be self employed and work from home quite legally.
Yes, me too. I have my own business working as a writer/researcher. I don't need to be "registered" other than with HMRC. Council don't care, insurance don't care, mortgage people don't care.

Different scenario if you have customers coming and going from your home address.

One delivery once a week is nothing to get upset about, I am on nodding terms with our DPD driver as he delivers to me or our neighbours every other day.

ShingleBeach · 16/08/2021 08:27

Why the hell could B not have spoken to A and asked if alternative delivery arrangements could be made?
E.g to the end of the road or A delivered and collected to a depot?

Rather than go behind their back and get their livelihood trashed?

Lockdown increased curtain twitching. If people were out at work and kids in school they wouldn’t even know a van was in the cul de sac.

If there was genuine inconvenience, talk directly to the person causing it to see if there is a solution.

3Br1tnee · 16/08/2021 08:28

@Neighbourshateeachother

Neighbour A runs (ran) a small online business from home (pre pandemic). During the lockdown as more people were buying online business went up. Due to nature of the business a large lorry would visit neighbour A weekly to deliver stock and sometimes Ups / DHL would make visits to collect / deliver.

Neighbour B has young children and likes them to play outside and didn’t didn’t like the ‘busyness’ of the street which is a nice quiet cul de sac. Neighbour B reported neighbour A to the council and got the business shut down.

Neighbour A found out neighbour B was responsible for this and told everyone in the street both in person and on the street WhatsApp chat.

Other residents of the street now feel awkward. Who IBU neighbour A or B?

B of course. What kind of a cunt do you need to be, to shut down someone's livlihood Confused
PalmsandCharms · 16/08/2021 08:31

Neighbour B is a nasty jealous individual and actually deserves everything they get.

Boulshired · 16/08/2021 08:33

Councils on making decision are very mindful of legal action being taken upon them. There has to be more than a few deliveries when home delivery is now the norm and working from home encouraged.

RincewindsHat · 16/08/2021 08:35

@itcouldhave

I live in a quiet close like this, for the last 18 months a neighbour has been having full sized articulated lorries delivering 1-2 times a week

I’m not trying to be funny here, but what an earth can two full size artics be delivering to a single household in one week and where the fuck are they keeping it? That’s a LOT of storage in a residential street.

The lorries are full sized, but they're probably delivering to multiple places, so whatever they're delivering here would not be the entire lorry's worth of stock.
Merryoldgoat · 16/08/2021 08:42

Neighbour B is an arsehole.

thecatsabsentcojones · 16/08/2021 08:53

Neighbour B. What an arse. She doesn’t know what neighbour A is going to contend with financially now. There’s such entitlement now. One delivery a week is nothing.