Neighbours Dogs - Noise complaint?

[LostFrog]

Anyone had any experience of making a noise complaint to their council about neighbours dogs? Our neighbours have a dog that barks incessantly when we go in the garden or come in/out our back gate. This was bad enough, but they have now got a second dog that barks in the house, frequently, and whenever someone walks past the front window.

The neighbours are a woman and two grown up daughters, and there is nearly always someone in the house because they don’t appear to work, or not full time, so the dogs shouldn’t be lonely. I think they just ignore them.

I know advice is to talk to neighbours, but Unfortunately, neighbours are quite hostile to everyone and if I go round I’m not sure they would even answer the door - we’ve had this before when we’ve gone round, e.g. with parcels. I hate confrontation at the best of times, but the way they are makes me even more nervous about it.

Also, I know that making a complaint could damage our chances of selling our house, but I’m not sure who would buy it right now anyway - it would put anyone off.

It is making me miserable, like I can’t enjoy my home or garden, it’s like being bullied.
WIBU to go to the council?

Go to the council if you want to, but I’d really think first about what you want the outcome to be versus what the impact on you could be.

There’s very little the council can or will actually do basically. The first thing they do is send them a letter basically letting them know somebody has complained about the barking- would they know it was you? Could that be difficult?

The council will then advise you to keep a diary of all noise for 28 days.

Once that happens, they come and investigate themselves, and basically they only find it to be a nuisance if it literally constant barking and if it is unprompted. If it’s in reaction to things e.g. postman, parcel delivery, someone walking past the window, then the council aren’t going to do anything anyway other than ask them to please keep it down. People seem to think the councils have a lot of power here but they really don’t, barking has to basically be constant and unprovoked before there is anything that can be done.

Plus it will cause issues selling your house as you mention so I would definitely think carefully. Report to the council if you want to of course but just be aware it could make things worse and cause you more problems only for the council to do absolutely nothing anyway.

I hear you, but what option does that leave me with? I hate the idea of moving, quite apart from the cost this is our home that we have worked hard to get, if someone were to come and view it they would be put off by the noise anyway.

It leaves you with the only option, speak to them?

Realistically it’s going to be either you speak to them or the council send them a letter saying someone has made a noise complaint. Unless they ate barking constantly all day the council have no teeth to actually do anything about it and most people know that now so aren’t massively bothered by it.

I would try speaking to them if I was you first, we had the same situation with neighbours a few years ago and went through the whole process to no avail so I do know how frustrating it can be! It might be that the neighbours don’t realise how loud it is & how much it bothers you, so if you have a word they may make more effort?

NDN dog barks from 5am to 3/4/5pm every day. Constantly.

I made a noise complaint. The council wrote to them, then the council wrote back to say they had investigated and closed the case.

I wouldn’t report this. It will become a dispute that you need to declare if you want to sell, a council isn’t likely to be able to do much- particularly when it is you setting the dogs off.

Realistically how much disturbance can a dog be if it barking when you go through a gate? It’s not like it is disturbing you when you are asleep or working? For the amount of hostility reporting their pets is likely to cause I would just suck this up as part and parcel of having neighbours.

You never know- they could be cursing you for banging that bloody gate again.

Hello, thanks all. Just to be clear - it’s not just us going out in the garden that sets them off. It’s any slight disturbance, whether that’s someone walking past the front or the back, a bird landing in the garden, me going out to hang out the washing - even though its a high wall and it can’t see me. I’m sitting in my bedroom, at the front of the house, right now and I can hear them barking in the back garden. They are just highly reactive, noisy dogs. And they do disturb me when I am working, I work from home and they bark when people walk past the house, and just seemingly randomly throughout the day. They don’t bark in the night, but they do bark very early in the morning (6am this morning).
I will try talking to them, but they are just so hostile to everyone, I’m a bit scared of them to be honest, I know that sounds pathetic.

If they are the sort of people you are making out you are likely to have to put up with it unfortunately. Your best option is to just sell the house

You could try one of these, facing in the direction of the dogs. Works on our dogs.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CJRJDCYS?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

I once got complained about to the council for not having a special breed of dog that was silent 24hrs a day. The person who complained was caught actually winding the dog up on purpose and making him bark so that he could complain. I then found out he was approaching neighbours who had no issues with me and trying to encourage them to complain about me. It wasn't very nice.

I remember thinking how shitty it was and that the same people would soon complain if they got broken into and the dog next door didn't make a sound.

If it's getting really bad I would perhaps speak to them first. I don't like,e barking myself and knew the issue was being exaggerated.

I get it, a dog barking is annoying. But it needs to be a certain threshold for the council to consider doing anything. The council takes a reasonable approach of all dogs make some noise and it is to be expected. The problem is when people get annoyed by a small amount of barking- and it isn’t enough for the council to do anything. Then they either start intentionally winding the dogs up -as in your case; or exaggerating the level of barking to try and get it taken seriously.

I’m a bit dubious here to be honest, where in the OP it was mentioned that the dogs bark when someone is in the back garden and gates bang, and now they are “highly reactive”, bark as soon as a bird lands etc. The story has changed somewhat.

@paintingvenice my OP says:
This was bad enough, but they have now got a second dog that barks in the house, frequently, and whenever someone walks past the front window.

i should have been clearer that it wasn’t just us setting the dogs off in the back garden. I was trying to highlight the fact that we couldn’t spend time in our back garden in peace, but it’s not just us setting them off.

I don’t expect silence. I doubt we are silent. Our neighbours on the other side have a dog which obviously barks occasionally, but when it does they deal with it. I was just interested to see if anyone had successfully complained to the council because our council website makes it sound straightforward but doesn’t mention any outcomes. It’s not sounding like a good option.

Have you spoken to your neighbours?- they may not be aware of the noise the dogs are having on your lives. I say this as my neighbours complained after 18 months that my Cocker Spaniel was making too much noise - their complaint was it barking too much whenever somebody with a dog passed the house. I am semi-detached and to be honest did not think it was an issue. I think they were being OTT as a pass a number of houses in the village where dogs will bark when another dog passes. I have clamped down on the dogs behaviour so he stops barking and bring him in from the garden should he start as my dog is very protective of 'his garden'

Hey OP, did you have any resolution to the barking issue?

We have just moved into a house with two alsations who live in the backgarden and like your neightbouts dogs, bark at everything. We have a nice collie next door who ocasionally barks but its not an issue, these dogs are an issue. Idont knwo what to do :(

Deleted. I didn’t realise it was an old post.