I was not going to mention services charges or anything about Stevenage Homes again on this blog. I’ve set up Stevenage Leaseholders Online just to moan about them. But I had to share this.

Stevenage Homes have at last replied to my query. The email arrived on the 9th March 2010. I first enquired 13 November 2009.

After nearly four months of silence, two weeks after launching Stevenage Leaseholders Online I receive an email from Michael Olawepo. It was flagged high priority (you have to laugh).

With no apology for the months it took to respond, Mr Olawepo gets straight to the point. He’s complaining. I had said that “Stevenage Homes have cancelled some recent forums due to lack of interest”. Mr Olawepo:

At the end of the leasehold forum of 12 August 2009, which you attended, it was agreed that the date of the next meeting was to be confirmed, and this was noted in the minutes of the meeting. The earlier proposed meeting for 21 October was not cancelled but postponed/rescheduled for 25 November 2009, which you attended. And it was at this meeting that it was further proposed that the meeting of 9 December 2009 would be cancelled as there was only a fortnight between the dates. It was also noted by leaseholders that a meeting in December would not be well attended due to the holidays. It was then motioned that no further meeting be held until April 2010 as the fourth meeting of the financial year 2009/10.

All leaseholders present including yourself agreed to this arrangement as noted in the minutes of the meeting. I also refer you to the terms of reference of the leasehold forum which states there will be at least four general meetings of the Forum in any year.
Dates of meetings held in 2009/10 are as follows;
(1) 15th April, (2) 17th June, (3) 12th August, (4) 25th November.

In view of the decisions of those present at these meetings the blog is an unfair and incorrect representation of the facts.

So, anyone who didn’t skim the above three paragraphs now has a fair and correct representation of the facts.

To me, a typical leaseholder, which meetings Stevenage Homes cancelled last year, which meetings they moved, what was said at which meeting, these things are trivial. This is why my memory of them is imperfect.

To me, a typical leaseholder, why Stevenage Homes was paying out £3000 to on fire alarm call out for The Towers is important. Because I have to pay part of the bill.

Simples!

At least I got some kind of response to my questions.

I appear to have rattled someone’s cage.

blue blue

Bad news, I’m going to spend it in a blue bubble.

There have been a couple of beautiful days this week. I’m considering taking my hiking boots of for the year. But my usual pleasure at watching Stevenage burst into spring from eight floors up is diminished by the scaffolding and blue stuff I’m encased in.

Then there’s the drilling.

I had a note through my letter box, telling me that the drilling will only take a day and would be carried out on Tuesday 2 March. I took all ornaments off window sills and pictures off externals walls and went out for the day.

I came home to find the drillers turned up around 16:00 for a couple of hours and left again. The caretakers, nor anyone else, has a clue what’s going on.

Same ol’ same old.

They started drilling again 11am today. Ten seconds drilling, 5 seconds break. Repeat until insanity sets in. And as they get nearer my floor it gets louder.

And I can’t go out today because I am waiting for my new TV to arrive. Nor can I put on my iPod loud, in case I miss the delivery.

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

This song by David Bowie trips through what is left of my mind every time I look out the window. The fit to my life right now is scary. Must have been arranged by aliens.

Blue, blue, electric blue
That’s the colour of my room
Where I will live
Blue, blue
…

I’m going to sit right down
Waiting for the gift of sound and vision

Or just possibly, I may murder the drillers when they reach my floor.

The scaffolding’s reached my floor. It’s strange to see people standing outside of my window. On the eighth, you get used to privacy. Walking into a room and coming face to face with someone is a shock.

new neighbours

But they have moved on up. Next they will be encapsulating us in the blue plastic. Everything will be dingy and blue.

I’m told that the worse part is when the drilling starts, eight hours a day, five days a week. I don’t know weather I’ll be able to work.

At the end the block will have cavity wall insulation. My heating bills should go down. Maybe it will be worth while.

great view

Another couple of letters arrived from Stevenage Homes today. Again, I haven’t opened them as I don’t want to spoil my good mood.

Tomorrow maybe, after I finish the Leaseholders Online site.

home (not so) sweet home

It keeps getting cut off. I have called Virgin Media four times in the last week. It’s getting ridiculous.

It’s also getting expensive. Calls to Virgin customer service costs 40 pence a minute on my mobile. And each call takes on average ten minutes.

They’ve changed the call waiting system since I last called. Now, “to ease the pain of waiting” you can select the type of music to listen to (at 40 pence a minute). You make your selection. It then ignores it completely and plays the same song

…Pain not eased.

It turns out the wires are being cut maliciously. I’m told I’m not the only one affected. It’s nothing personal.

Apparently’ someone’s “in dispute” with Virgin Media. Something I find easy to believe. I’m not a happy customer.

The last time the technician called, I got him to show me the junction box. It’s not exactly safe or secure.

I’ve been promised there’ll be a new case fitted soon. Meanwhile, you don’t need CIA training to tap my phone. I guess I should be please someone drew attention to the fact.

Another reason to dump the landline September 2010.

where am i?

I have trouble waking up on winter mornings.

Summer I’m OK, I leave the curtains open. I wake up no problem. The sun shining into my bedroom.

Winter’s a different matter. I find it very hard to get out of bed. Perhaps it’s that I’m too tight to have the heating on for long. Anything over 20 DegC is outrageous opulence.

My niece just started selling for Avon. I looked through the catalogue. There was an alarm clock with a light. The light brightens slowly over 20 minutes to simulate a sunrise.

no no, not the cyottees!

I thought I’d give it a go and bought one. I set my clock radio to come on 10 minutes into the lighting sequence.

Two weeks on, I find I’m not waking up consistently. The light sometimes wakes me, but I can’t rely on it. The alarm with the light is not particularly harsh.

And I have to pick the thing up to find the off switch.

During the 20 minutes between the light coming on and it reaching full brightness I have been having the strangest dreams. Not that I can remember any now. And when I do wake up I am very confused.

On Sunday I overslept by two hours. It’s been years since I overslept without going to bed late.

So I have got my old alarm clock out again. It is really harsh and I have never slept through it. But I also have the lamp beside my bed.

I’m disorientated when I wake up, but the strange dreams are kind o’ fun.

ohhhh yeah

burnt out circuit board

It was the circuit board. You do not have to be an electrician to see there is something wrong with it.

It was only five years old.

The price of the new board was £150. That’s the same price as the motherboard in this computer. But the processing power to run a household boiler is minimal.

I suppose the much smaller numbers of boards for a boiler compared to a PC explains part of the price. But I still feel ripped off

More home maintenance this week. I fixed the pull switch in the bathroom. The spring had been going for a while, it finally gave up last week. I couldn’t get an exact replacement and now have a hole in the bath room ceiling to fill.

I have spent about £200 on the flat this week. I’m a bit broke. Rather than go out tonight, I’ll sit and luxuriate in the warmth generated by my now working heating system. And maybe turn the light on and off in the bathroom a few times.

And good TV tonight with a new episodes of House, later Chelsea beating the Arsenal 3-0.

The heating had not come on. When I looked at the boiler, the overheat light was on. The fail safe had cut-out.

Normally it resets if you turn the boiler off for a minute. Not this time.

Mick Carrol came round lunch time and took a look. There was water inside, possibly from last night’s storms. It has been raining heavily all weekend.

Mick thinks the circuit board has got wet and will most likely need replacing. I need to contact Kevin Knibbs to see what he can do. Problem is, it’s an old boiler, spare parts may be difficult to find.

So no hot water or heating for the next couple of days. Not too big a problem as I have an electric shower. The weather is not too cold as yet.

If I can’t get spare parts for the boiler, I will have to get a new one installed. That’ll be a pain. A new boiler can’t be installed where the old one was, due to changes in the law. It will cost quite a bit to have the new system installed.

On the positive side, a new condensing boiler will be more energy efficient. Plus, I will no longer have a storage tank of hot water to heat up. I use very little hot water.

It’s just that money’s tight right now .

They normally just issue a bill detailing the actual costs. But they are obliged in law to provide a break down if requested.

the man, the place

The last couple of years I have requested a breakdown and successfully challenged some of the costs.

Last year, there were a lot of extra charges to do with fire doors. It took over three months to resolve. I don’t think they ever found the receipts for the work carried out.

This year there was a new process in place. Things are supposed to have improved. It’s started out badly.

I asked for the breakdown on 29th September and I was told that they had been “inundated with queries regarding the actuals.” I eventually received the breakdown on October 23rd.

The latest “repair” bill includes over £3000 for responses to fire alarms. This is a considerable increase on last year.

As far as I am aware there were no fires in the block, so all these alarms were either false alarms or the results of faults in the system.

I raised the following questions:

• Why there is such large increase over last years costs.
• Why there are sometimes multiple invoices for the same incident.
• Why one incident cost £1043.93, when the usual cost is between £80 – £280

I have received a reply, saying my enquiry has been passed on to the manager, Michael Olawepo.

He’s the guy who wants to increase our management fee by 700%.

sunset in southgate

A time of day for reflections.

My flat faces north and west, so I don’t get to see the sunset directly. But I do get to see sunsets reflected in Southgate House.

I like this picture, you can clearly see my block reflected in silhouette. Compare this to this sunrise and this picture of The Towers from the tax office.

OK, no more picture of Stevenage tower blocks.

big brother's view

The end of October marks the last day for handing in your tax self assessment forms. Although you can file on-line until the end of January.

And the postal strike makes things more interesting. Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) site is not very helpful. It tells you to make sure you post early. No excuse accepted.

I normally avoid everything to do with form filling. I worry about facing fines if I make a mistake. The last two years I had an accountant file my return for me. This year I decided to do it myself. “It can’t be that hard”, I thought. “Save money and get to know my business better.”

I booked myself onto a HMRC workshop. A whole morning on tax returns. It was very useful. The tax man (or tax woman in this case) appeared to be quite human.

She said that they did not expect us to be accountants. As long as we made a genuine effort to get the calculations correct, we would not be fined for mistakes. Just charged the outstanding amount with interest.

An interesting statement. My accountant estimated several of the more complex calculations. I do not think I was getting value for money from them. Another reason to file for myself.

Stevenage tax office is in Southgate House. The building next to mine. You can see it in silhouetted in this sunrise picture Whilst I was there, I took a picture of my flat. Not very good quality, but that’s camera phones for you.

I realised how easy it is to see into my my home from these offices.

Makes it nice and easy for the tax man to check on me.