Family billed to cover neighbours' service charge
Sarah-Jane SmithA family say they are angry at being handed an unexpected bill from a property firm to cover missed payments by their neighbours.
Sarah-Jane Smith and her husband David, who live on Ladgate Woods Estate in Middlesbrough, received a surprise bill from Gateway Property Management to cover their neighbours' unpaid service charges.
"They should take the legal action on the people who haven't paid, not penalise the people who have," said Mrs Smith.
A spokesperson for Gateway said it was "unfortunate" the costs needed to be passed on to other residents, but it would reimburse the money once it collected it from those who had not paid.
The £24 additional bill was sent to a number of households on the estate and covers unpaid bills throughout 2024.
Mrs Smith said although the fee is "not a great deal of money" she was annoyed because her family had paid their share.
"We've already paid £190. Why should you have to foot the bill for people who haven't paid?" she said.
'Forced to comply'
Mrs Smith said she was worried refusing to pay the fee could make it more difficult to sell their home in the future as they could be classed as being in an ongoing dispute with their estate management company.
Because of this, she said her family felt "forced to comply".
Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland MP Luke Myer said he had written to Gateway and asked for the legal and contractual justifications of the charge.
"People should not be expected to pay unfair or unexplained charges with no clear basis," he said
Gateway said the additional fee issued to residents was a "balancing charge" to cover an overspend in its service charge budget.
"To ensure the development does not suffer from cash flow issues and [prevent] services from being disrupted, we have been forced to credit control service charge debtors, resulting in additional costs, which is unfortunate," a spokesperson said.
"However, we do seek payment of those additional costs from the relevant debtors and once funds are received the service charge is reimbursed."