Customer Information

(1) This summary, which briefly sets out your rights and obligations in relation to administration charges, must by law accompany a demand for administration charges. Unless a summary is sent to you with a demand, you may withhold the administration charge. The summary does not give a full interpretation of the law and if you are in any doubt about your rights and obligations you should seek independent advice.

(2) An administration charge is an amount which may be payable by you as part of or in addition to the rent directly or indirectly –

for or in connection with the grant of an approval under your lease, or an application for such approval;

for or in connection with the provision of information or documents;

in respect of your failure to make any payment due under your lease; or

in connection with a breach of a covenant or condition of your lease.

If you are liable to pay an administration charge, it is payable only to the extent that the amount is reasonable.

(3) Any provision contained in a grant of a lease under the right to buy under the Housing Act 1985, which claims to allow the landlord to charge a sum for consent or approval, is void.

(4) You have the right to ask the First-tier Tribunal whether an administration charge is payable. You may make a request before or after you have paid the administration charge. If the tribunal determines the charge is payable, the tribunal may also determine -

who should pay the administration charge and who it should be paid to;

the amount;

the date it should be paid by; and

how it should be paid.

However, you do not have this right where-

a matter has been agreed to or admitted by you;

a matter has been, or is to be, referred to arbitration or has been determined by arbitration and you agreed to go to arbitration after the disagreement about the administration charge arose; or

a matter has been decided by a court.

(5) You have the right to apply to the First-tier Tribunal for an order varying the lease on the grounds that any administration charge specified in the lease, or any formula specified in the lease for calculating an administration charge is unreasonable.

(6) Where you seek a determination or order from the First-tier Tribunal, you will have to pay an application fee and, where the matter proceeds to an oral hearing, a hearing fee, unless you qualify for fee remission or exemption. Making such an application may incur additional costs, such as professional fees, which you may have to pay.

(7) The First-tier Tribunal and the Upper Tribunal (in determining an appeal against a decision of the First-tier Tribunal) have the power to award costs in accordance with section 29 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007.

(8) Your lease may give your landlord a right of re-entry or forfeiture where you have failed to pay charges which are properly due under the lease. However, to exercise this right, the landlord must meet all the legal requirements and obtain a court order. A court order will only be granted if you have admitted you are liable to pay the amount or it is finally determined by a court, a tribunal or by arbitration that the amount is due. The court has a wide discretion in granting such an order and it will take into account all the circumstances of the case.

All commercial waste must be disposed of through a commercial waste contractor.

We aspire to keep our Estate presentable at all times. We ask that you take full responsibility of your waste from the point it leaves your premises to disposal.

You must always seek permission from the Landlord prior to commencing any works in your property.

We advise you to contact our Estate Manager to discuss the alterations process and any relevant documentation that is required.

In the first instance, please refer to your lease obligations.

Should you require any assistance with this, please contact your Property Manager or the Commercial Asset Manager.

An inventory and schedule of condition of the property will be provided for your reference when you move in. We will pay for the inventory check in. You pay for the inventory check out when you leave.

Check that you have set-up all of your utilities correctly and that they are in your name. If you need assistance, contact the Residential Lettings team for guidance.

We aim to deal with all maintenance and repair issues as quickly as possible. As a minimum, all enquiries will be acknowledged within one working day. We will advise you as soon as possible if the enquiry is going to take longer than the time detailed below to be resolved and advise when the problem will be resolved.

Emergency repairs (e.g. flood in your property) will always be responded to within 24 hours. For your information, emergency repairs can be defined as those likely to cause a risk to your health or safety, or cause serious damage to the building. To ensure your safety it may be necessary for us to carry out temporary repairs in the first instance.

Any urgent repairs (e.g. broken entry phone or communal lift) will be dealt with within a three day period. Urgent repairs are defined as repairs that materially affect your comfort or convenience.

All other repairs (e.g. window cannot be opened or broken washing machine) will be responded to and dealt with within a 7 day period.

Please refer to your tenancy agreement for information relating to bank details and rent due dates.

For further information your rental account, please speak to the Finance team.

South Kensington Estates does not permit any market let tenants to make alterations to their property.

If you are a long leaseholder on our Estate, you must always seek permission from the Landlord prior to commencing any works in your property.

You are advised to contact our Estate Manager to discuss the alterations process and any relevant documentation that is required.

In the first instance, please refer to your welcome pack.

Alternatively, the rubbish and recycling collection dates can be found on the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea website: https://www.rbkc.gov.uk/bins-and-recycling

We aspire to keep our Estate presentable at all times. We ask that you take full responsibility of your waste from the point it leaves your premises to disposal.

Complaints Handling Procedure (“CHP”)

We are committed to providing a professional service to all our clients and customers. When something goes wrong, we need you to tell us about it. This will help us to improve our standards.
If you have a complaint, please put it in writing, including as much detail as possible. Our CHP has a two stage process. Stage One of the CHP gives our firm the opportunity to review and consider your complaint in full. Our firm will try to resolve your complaint to your satisfaction.

Please address your initial written complaint to:

Director of Operations
South Kensington Estates Ltd
Alfred House
23-24 Cromwell Place
SW7 2LD
Tel: 0207 761 6420
Complaints Email: complaints@ske.org
General Email: info@ske.org
Website: www.ske.org

We will then respond in line with the timeframes set out below (if you feel we have not sought to address your complaints within eight weeks, you may be able to refer your complaint to the Property Ombudsman to consider without our final viewpoint on the matter).

What will happen next?

•We will send you a letter acknowledging receipt of your complaint within 3 working days of receiving it, enclosing a copy of this procedure.

•We will then investigate your complaint. This will normally be dealt with by the Director of Operations who will review your file and speak to the member of staff who dealt with you. A formal written outcome of our investigation will be sent to you within 15 working days of sending the acknowledgement letter.

•If, at this stage, you are still not satisfied, you should contact us again and we will arrange for a separate review to take place by another senior member of staff.

•We will write to you within 15 working days of receiving your request for a review, confirming our final viewpoint on the matter.

•If you are still not satisfied after the last stage of the in-house complaint procedure (or more than 8 weeks has elapsed since the complaint was first made) you can request an independent review from The Property Ombudsman without charge.

For consumer related complaints:
The Property Ombudsman
Milford House
43-55 Milford Street
Salisbury
Wiltshire
SP1 2BP
01722 333 306
admin@tpos.co.uk
www.tpos.co.uk

Please note the following:

You will need to submit your complaint to The Property Ombudsman within 12 months of receiving our final viewpoint letter, including any evidence to support your case.

The Property Ombudsman requires that all complaints are addressed through this in-house complaint’s procedure, before being submitted for an independent review.

As a RICS regulated company, if we are unable to agree on how to resolve your commercial complaint within the aforementioned process and timeline, then you have the opportunity to take your complaint to an independent redress provider, as approved by the RICS Regulatory Board (please see below):

Commercial business complaints:

RICS Dispute Resolution Service
55 Colmore Row
Birmingham
B3 2AA
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7334 3806
Fax: + 44 (0) 20 7334 3802
Email: drs@rics.org
Website www.rics.org

If you cannot access your property and it is outside of office hours, we advise you to call our Concierge service. You can either call the office number on 020 7761 6420 and be redirected or call the Concierge direct. Please refer to the contacts page in your welcome pack.

We do not hold duplicates of commercial property keys. If you have made a special request for us to hold a set of keys for your property, please call the office number on 020 7761 6420 and you will be redirected accordingly.

We encourage our tenants to be active members of the community they live and work in. To support this, we will be launching a loyalty programme which will entitle any tenant belonging to the Estate to receive specific discounts and benefits to encourage everyone to shop, eat and relax locally.

If you would like to further information on the programme, please contact the Customer Relationship Manager or call the office on 020 7761 6420.