They’ve attached a GIANT fence… to MY fence !!

[Finetoday]

Exactly that !

Neighbour behind has a 6 foot old wooden fence.
I have a 6 foot fairly new 6 foot fence of the concrete posts and board variety.
There is a 2 foot ‘No man’s land’ in between that the builders of my house/estate left when they erected this perimeter fence (we are on edge of development).

Came home today to find neighbours erecting a fence with 12 foot posts and 10 foot panels ! It’s flipping huge !

On Inspection, I can see he’s attached said monstrosity to my nice fence by drilling holes in my concrete posts, and attaching wooden battens which form a framework with metal brackets that bridge the 2 foot gap !

I asked him to take it off my nice fence - he turned his drill on and turned his back to me and carried on. It’s now fully installed.

I’ll try and upload photos for you all to appreciate his workmanship.

AIBU to contact Council ?
AIBU to saw the metal brackets half way ?

This ^ or what would areas look like x

Have you spoken to the Council yet this morning OP?

From a legal perspective contact a solicitor. But this is almost certainly something your planning enforcement team will deal with. I'd contact them and send in photos. A fence of that height will need planning permission.

I thought you were only allowed 6ft fencing or am I mistaken.

That's outrageous. Tbh unless it blocks light, the height wouldn't bother me as it gives you more privacy.

The part that would bother me is him drilling into your concrete posts - it can crack or weaken them. You need permission to attach anything to someone else's fence.

6 foot is the highest or they need council planning.

For info I put up a 6'6" fence down the side of our house between our house and neighbours as they were looking in our windows, the council came round and told me to reduce it to 6' which I had to do by cutting 6" off the base of each panel !!!

It will be interesting to see what effect the wind has on this structure. Hopefully you are not in a windy area or by the coast. If the whole thing deconstructs in high winds you could get bits of fence flying through the air at high speed. What orientation is the garden ?

I wonder if those huge brown uprights are anchored in the ground on the other side. I note there is a gap at the top for putting extra panels in case the current ones aren't high enough.

What is the large grey panel in the second picture ? That looks oversize too.

I think your measurements are a bit off, your fence does not look 6ft compared to your shed (nor does it look fairly new) and the gap between the two fences doesn't look like 2ft. It does look like they've done a really weird job of putting in the new fence as it looks like they've left their old one standing. But if I were you I'd be glad of the privacy, based on the shadows in the photo it will block the neighbour's light not yours

We've recently looked into this as we want to raise our fence height and the highest is 2M which (according to google) is 6.56 feet, so I'm amazed the council made you reduce unless it was an obstruction or light issue?.

As others have said, he can't put up a fence that big without planning permission. I would expect the council to tell him to take it down. He is also liable for the cost of fixing any damage to your fence, e.g. filling the holes he's drilled or, if required, replacing damaged concrete posts. I doubt the cost of fixing it exceeds £10k even if you have to replace the entire fence, so you can claim this through the small claims court if you wish. You won't need a solicitor.

Please be very careful not to lose your temper when dealing with 'officials' as its easy to come across as a hysterical female, or to say something you later regret.
I understand you can get an hour's free consultation with a solicitor, which you should do if this is correct, but first I'd get some facts from Citizens Advice about this.
It really is important to get the council people on your side however furious you are.
ps, what would you have said if he'd first come round and politely asked if it was OK to use your concrete posts to secure his fence?

Cheeky bugger. Take your fence down… see if he likes that

Agree with this.
I am going to take a wild guess that this has probably been an issue or a conversation prior to them taking such drastic action also (not that I’m condoning it)

It looks a bit short but it isn't that short, especially if you add in the gravel boards.

Irrespective of the height of the fence, going around drilling holes into other peoples posts and potentially damaging them/using to support structures for which they were not originally intended, that's not on.

Yes, agree he's a total CF to attach to your fence - cheeky bar steward! With regard the size of the fence - looking at the house that I can only assume is his - is his ground higher so in fact he only actually has a 6ft fence but looks higher because you are lower down? Can't tell from pic.

He’s a right CF, usually I’m a let things go type of person but 1) the cheek of ignoring you and carrying on regardless and 2) he’s basically erected a giant sail which will put pressure on your fence which he’s also damaged / weakened by drilling through. I’d take great pleasure in being as awkward as all hell on this 😡

This is criminal damage
Take lots of photos
Contact the council
Be prepared to contact the police
In the meantime, stick a laminated notice to their fence giving them five working days to remove their pins and battens, and include the costs for replacing your damaged concrete posts (you might need to get a quote from the builder who erected it if that wasn't you)
If they don't remove them in five days, hire a high powered saw with a metal blade, and shear off the bolts, leaving the body embedded in your concrete posts

Sorry if this has been asked and answered but how much higher is your neighbours garden compared to yours?

Clearly the new fence is bloody massive, but I wonder if the old fences were normally level in height because the Op and the neighbours house are on the same level or, was his fence on higher ground so maybe he had a 4' fence which made them level. If his garden is way higher you're always going to have this issue with his fence being higher than yous (admittedly not quite as much as you have now!) .
Either way but has gone slightly mad with his sizes (*insert a joke here about Men exaggerating sizes 😂😂)

Looks like you've answered this earlier - apologies. Would love to know how you get on!

@BusyMum47But an 8ft fence is illegal! Have you definitely told them the fence is 8ft tall or have you focused more on the paint issue?

They have decking which he is standing on so height is raised. We don’t know how high this decking is - there is a max of 300mm height as someone said up thread. He shouldn’t be using the height of decking as a start point to measure height of fencing. Should be using the natural ground level.

You can see from photo 2 the old fence is approx. the same height as the OPs fence. But it is hard to tell how much it is above the ground. The only reference point you have is the guys waist in the photo and there is no guarantee he is not standing on something.

If he is standing on the ground which would put his old fence at the minimum height I would guess it is around 3ft depending on how giant the guy is, the old fence comes about halfway up the panel, so it is possible that fence is not so giant as it seems as it could be placed on high ground.

It still doesn't excuse the way it is attached though. And the fence posts extending that far up are an eyesore. But maybe he is going to cut them off somehow when he completes the construction.

OP, I suspect your fence is actually 5 foot tall, 1 foot gravel board and 4 foot panels. Looking at the type of neighbours old fence it looks like it could be either 3 foot or 4 foot tall.

So neighbour definitely has a height difference on their land. The neighbours decking is going to be at least a foot tall, so I suspect that their new fence panels don’t even touch the ground but are only fastened to their new posts and your fence.

So they have 6ft panels fastened one foot in the air making it two foot higher than your 5ft fence : with an engineering disaster that has caused criminal damage to your fence.

Ah I did wonder, thanks.
And I agree absolutely, he shouldn’t be using the height of the decking as a starting point

Yes that is an important point. Dont want foxes or hedgehogs trapped.