Short and sweet, this time. (Student Accommodation in general)

Member Name: angry chris

Product:	Student Accommodation in general
Date:	18/11/02 (222 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: I didn't drown in the torrent., I left, My flatmates were great.

Disadvantages: The place was nowhere near finished., I have had no money back yet., They treat you like a piece of s**t.

I am not going to write my usual lengthy opinion on this subject. Indeed, I am only writing after reading a couple of the other reviews on this subject, and felt the urge to tell my brief tale. As usual, I shall live up to my username...
As those of you who have read my brief profile know, I am currently studying at Northumbria University. This was not always the case. Indeed, this year I began my LLB at Sheffield Hallam University, and accepted the accomodation offered to me by the Uni at Exchange Works, Arundel Street- a newly built block of flats desighed for students. Due to the newness of the flats, the rent was the highest of any of the student buildings in the city, nearly £1000 per term. Now, as a working class lad with no parental finance to back me up, this was always going to be difficult, and I was initially going to have to live entirely on my student loan(until I found a job, of course).

When I arrived in Mid-September, I was surprised to see a posse of builders milling around the flats. It turned out that they had just started building them a matter of months earlier, and the place was not ready. The common room was empty, the launderette was minus washine machines, the stairs were still without carpet and windows, the rooms were missing furniture and carpet and many of the windows were not able to open. The rooms had phone line sockets, but they were unconnected and thus unusable.

Now, this is fair enough, nothing too major, but there was no explaination or apology from the on site reps, and certainly no offer of a rent reduction for the missing facilities. Then, when the time came to take my rent out of the bank, they managed to take it out of my current account, rather than my student account, and so I got landed with an unauthorised overdraft charge!

Then suddenly, I found something odd had happened when I returned from lectures one morning. My books, which had been scattered all over my table near the
window(typical student mess!) were placed in a neat pile on my bed. And my window was open. I went downstairs to enquire at the desk, and they told me that a couple of builders had been in my room and fixed the window while I was away. They had also sealed the leak in my shower. This was in direct breach of the contract I signed which stated that notice be given before people wandered in and out of my room, and started messing around with my stuff. And the shower still leaked.

Then, the friendly builders began drilling holes in the adjacent walls at 7.30am, every morning, for a fortnight, giving me and my roommates a very unwanted alarm call. To cap it all, on the one morning they were not drilling holes in my wall, I got a knock on the door at 9am. I ignored it, and went back to sleep, only to be awoken by the sound of a key turning in the lock. As you can imaging, the next words out of my dehydrated, hungover mouth were rather derogatory!

One week later, the missus informed me that she was pregnant, and like a good little lamb, I prepared to study at home. The night before I was due to come home, me and my flatmates decided to have a big blowout before I left. That night, however, the heavens opened and it rained steadily for a few hours. To our amazement, not only did the heavens open, but the roof also seemed to and water pis*ed through into the flat. The rest of the night was spent finding buckets and bins to collect the water and dry the bare floorboards to prevent it leaking to the flat underneath.

As my train was at 7am the next morning, final packing was a big rush as the night before had been taken up with flood detail, and I got home at 10pm, only to be amazed to get a phonecall from the landlords explaining that my room was not spotless- apparently the floor was a bit wet(!!!!!!!!), and a £50 cleaning charge would be coming out of my deposit, which I would get back in 28 days...

That was 5 weeks ago, and I
am still chasing my deposit and by excess rent down. I am still being charged a cleaning fee, despite speaking to a guy from head office on the night of the flood and being assured that "All those affected would be receiving compensation as appropriate". I am expecting a phone call tommorow to tell me when my money (nearly a grand) will be returned. I have already warned them that this is the last time they will talk to me, next it will be my solicitor.
I will keep you informed.

For sheer arrogance and poor service, this company cannot surely be beaten. They are UNITE, based in Bristol. I will be happy to pass on further details for anyone who has children offered accomodation by these scumbags. Tell them in no uncertain terms to go f**k themselves. I wish I had.

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