Legal Notices for non-payment of rent
What happens if you receive a Notice?
If we want you to leave your home because you haven't paid your rent you may be served a Notice – we use different Notices for different tenancy types, they are - Notice Seeking Possession, Notice of Possession Proceedings, Notice Seeking Termination of Tenancy and Notice to Quit. These are legal documents and it is the very first stage of our eviction process. If you receive any of these Notices it is very important that you contact us for help and advice.
We want to outline the main steps of the Notice process so you understand how it works:
- Step 1 - We serve a Notice and you are given a specific number of days (relevant to each Notice) to respond and make an arrangement to pay your rent. If you contact us within that timeframe and start making repayments we will not take any further action.
- Step 2 - If we don't hear from you within the stated time we will apply to the Court to ask for a hearing. We will inform you of the court date. At the hearing will ask for a possession order for your home. We can ask for outright possession - this requires you to leave your home - or a suspended possession for some tenancies - which means you can keep you home if you keep to the conditions set out by the court. If you don't keep to the conditions of your order we will ask for bailiffs to evict you.
- Step 3 - This depends on the court decision, which possession order is made against you, along with the tenancy type. Whatever order you receive, you will have to pay us court costs.
- Step 4 - If you receive an outright possession order we will request a warrant for bailiffs to evict you. If you refuse to leave, we will change the locks and request the police attend to remove you from you home.
What you should do if you receive a Notice from us: