Rendall and Rittner – service charges for 2020 go up by 17% at Chelsea Bridge Wharf (30% increase over 2 years)
On 28th Feb I received the latest service charge demand from Rendall and Rittner. The quarterly service charge from 1 April 2020 (1 bedroom flat in Warwick building) is £710.19 representing a 17% (seventeen per cent) increase on the previous year (£607.52). The inflation rate during this period was just 1.4%.
Over two years (2018-20), my service charge has increased by 30% (from £546.34 to £710.19)
It is clear that only a challenge at rent tribunal can stop this – please contact me if you wish to co-operate in such a challenge.
You can also contact Rendall and Rittner directly Jenniffer.Mann@rendallandrittner.co.uk or facilitiesmanager@chelseabridgewharf.com and ask for an explanation of the 30% service charge increase over the last 2 years, request that monthly or quarterly statements are issued to residents and demand that there should be no increase in the service charge in March 2021.
I hope you all manage to stay safe at this difficult time – I will be posting information re local resources and support in relation to COVID19 shortly.
How do we contact you if we’d like to find out more about the rent tribunal?
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Apologies for delay in responding. If you are a resident at CBW feel free to message me privately with contact details and I will keep you posted. also you may care to participate / support the case. Things have been delayed by COVID19 of course but I think it will soon be able to take things forward again. My service charge has gone up 30% in the last two years and I think there is every chance we will get a massive hike again next year – no doubt they will blame COVID19. There is always some excuse, but you have to work quite hard before they even tell you their excuse 🙂
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yes, agree that it has gone up a lot
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Hi, i am owner at CBW. Can you keep me updated? I want to replace RR
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Hi Natalia – I certainly will. Please email residents@chelseabridgewharf.org.uk and we can talk further and I will put you on my contact list for updates. Many of us certainly feel the same – the service charge increases are absurd and the attitude of many R&R management is totally unacceptable, They were appointed by Berkeley Homes, not by the residents and that explains most of the things that are wrong with how they treat residents. Many people have had enough now,
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yes certainly Natalia – I put you on my contact list 🙂
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Will service charge be lowered once we do not need the fire wardens ?
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Hi Tan – if you live in a block with fire wardens then yes in theory that should happen. But my service charges have gone up 30% in warwick over 2 years and we do not have any fire wardens as no cladding issues. So I suspect your service charges will be going up whatever happens. I am sure they will claim COVID19 has increased costs – they will always find something.
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Yes but Berkeley has agreed they will remove the cladding. When that happens, surely the whole development does not need the very expensive 24/7 fire wardens and costs of service charge should reduce, accordingly.
Thank you
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I don;t think BH have agreed to remove the cladding….. but if you have something concrete on that please do share….
But in any case the service charge rises are not just about fire wardens …R&R have made huge increases every year…
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Some years ago CBW fired the then-acting managing agents and Rendall Rittner won a tender. It’s about time we get other managing agents to submit offers and get rid of R+R. Prices are going up but issues are not getting resolved. CBW is a big piece of cake that most would jump at a chance to represent.
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I could not agree more. Rendall and Rittner were appointed by Berkeley Homes – they answer to them and not to us, the residents. They are a disgrace and need to be replaced as clearly they are incapable of change. the so called ”residents meeting” on 12th August with zero resident interaction was a joke. The are now talking about spending 1.3 million of our money (yes £1.3 million) on POND RELINING!!. 4 ponds, 1.3 million pounds. They will never change and must be replaced.
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I swear, they give half of these money back to Berkley homes… they are so corrupted.
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Rendall and Rittner are very sadly the ugly face of unacceptable rapacious capitalism. They are morally bankrupt and downright dishonest.
CBW residents must collectively REFUSE to pay any increase in service charges supposedly related to dangerous flammable cladding which, must be the prime responsibility of the developer, and also REFUSE to pay any increase linked to other unspecified service charge costs. Residents must write to their MP and the Minister for Housing for support and the MSM where opportunities arise. Sadly Rendall and Rittner will not consider the interests of their tenants,only their shareholders.
They will however prevaracate and obfuscate endlessly.
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I think many would agree but for legal reasons I must say that dishonesty has nor been proven. Well only sometimes… https://www.leaseholdknowledge.com/executive-guilty-of-plundering-122000-from-managing-agents-rendall-and-rittner/
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The power of a group of people should not be underestimated.
If R&R tenants were to COLLECTIVELY refuse to pay any proposed service charge increase related to ACM and COLLECTIVELY cancel their DD
service charge payments until such a time the ACM issue was resolved to the satisfaction of leaseholders R&R would start to sit up, take notice, and listen.As it is, they will simply ignore, or pay lip service to, a few letters of complaint from a few noisy disgruntled tenants protesting about service charge increases, safe in the knowledge the money will more or less keep flowing in regardless.
It may well be that the Law says that leaseholders are responsible for 100% of maintenance costs, but that would not necessarily extend to the compulsory cost of replacement of dangerous materials used as part of a building construction and subsequently found at the cost of great loss of life to put even more lives in real danger.
The USA have a class action legal process to resolve such situations and there are similar legal routes in the UK available to groups of individuals. CBW residents,and those in other R&R housing developments around the country similarly affected by ACM, should utilise their combined latent power and influence to seek Legal advice and challenge in court this egregious increase in service charges.
.
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At CBW after many years, Berkeley Homes have agreed to cover cost of cladding removal. Residents still being stung massively for cost of fire wardens which are being deployed to buildings with no cladding and which have current EWS certs. Whether residents are liable is a moot point – and of course government have provided a fund for this work, which is not sufficient and had to be applied for which R&R has failed to do in many cases. So there is no consistency at all across developments – in part because it is somewhat up to the freeholder to decide how to proceed. And mist of them are total b*****ards. A service charge strike has already happened at several developments and I think it would be a great idea to do that en masse.
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Once cladding is removed, fire wardens are not necessary and therefore, service charges should be reduced accordingly.
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