HBRA Updates - March 2025
Dear Residents,
It has been just over a month since my last email - so I thought it would be good to provide an update to all residents.
Unfortunately we have been delayed on most fronts by both CEL and Trust despite both my and David Chan's desire to get things done.
1) Election of David Chan as the new Director on the CEL board
Following the SGM in January, where David Chan was elected to be our Sector's CEL Director, we informed the CEL Board (via the Chair) of the election results. However, CEL have subsequently delayed confirming him as a Director by requesting more information about him, including asking for his CV. He has provided them with this - but they have still not responded nor registered him as Director on Companies House. There has to date been no explanation from CEL why this process is taking so long.
2) Disputed Invoices for Trust and Skylon
In September 2024 Trust took without authorisation around £23k in total from our Sector's Standard Services account. [Note: This is the bank account where our service charge payments go to pay for standard services eg. gardening/lighting etc. The Sector also has another bank account which is used for Major Works funds.] Trust transferred this money to the accounts of Trust and Skylon (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Trust) and claimed that this was the amount owing to them for time they both allegedly spent on matters concerning our major works - some items they are now claiming go back to 2019. This money was taken from our Sector account without the knowledge nor authorisation of our Sector Director at the time, Ruth-Marie Mackrodt. She was not provided with an invoice for these payments beforehand - and it has only been in January 2025 after multiple requests that Trust has finally provided the RA Committee with an invoice for Ben Mire's time (which he backdated to September 2024).
This £23k was taken from our Standard Services account and not our Major Works account - even though the matters they are claiming for relate to major works. After a great deal of hard work and insistence from the RA Committee that this money needs to be put back, Trust had finally in January 2025 repaid the monies they took BUT Trust has moved this money to the Sector's Major Works account to prevent us using it for Standard Services. The CEL Directors are in agreement with Trust that this money should be 'ring-fenced' for their charges - even though myself and the RA Committee do not agree or think this appropriate, especially as we are disputing many of these charges. If Trust had returned the money they took to the Standard Service account - or indeed not taken the money in the first place - our Sector would have £23k to use and be able to pay for all services e.g. gardening until the next service charge demand. Unfortunately, Trust's actions have caused our Sector account to run out of money.
3) Approval of the 2024-25 accounts and service charge demands
At the SGM in January we voted and agreed on our proposed budget for 2024-25. This was then sent to CEL. However, CEL has stated we must include an additional item in the budget to cover for the disputed invoices. We had not agreed to any of these charges previously and we are still waiting for Trust to provide the RA with some evidence of authorisation for the alleged works done by Trust and Skylon.
Peter Robin (CEL Director for Brocas and the CEL Finance Director) informed the RA Committee in November 2024 that he was carrying out an investigation into the disputed invoices and amounts due and would be compiling a report of his findings - however the RA is still waiting to hear from him/CEL with his conclusions and see a copy of his report.
As CEL will not accept the budget the RA had agreed on - it means that we cannot get service charge bills sent out to residents. The RA Committee has also requested banking controls to be added to the Sector bank account before a service charge demand is made, in order to protect Residents' money. See 4 below.
4) Agreement of banking controls
The RA Committee has requested that Trust agrees to get the approval of either the RA Chair or the RA Secretary before it can pay money from the Sectors bank accounts to itself or any related Company/person. We feel this is important to have in place before residents place more funds into the account, as currently Trust has full access to our accounts and there is nothing to prevent the same situation happening again. We have asked Trust to agree to our required controls - however they have not agreed to those terms thus far. We had also asked that Trust provide the Chair and Secretary with regular banking statements - so we can see what transactions are going out of the Sector accounts.
5) CEL withholding services to residents
According to the SoM (Schedule of Management), CEL has a duty to provide residents with standard services, such as gardening. CEL (by backing up Trust's actions) has caused our sector to run out of money for standard services - but CEL could (and indeed should) pay for our standard services in the meantime until money flows back in from the next service charge payment. Indeed the requirement to provide these services is not technically dependent on the payment of service charges by residents. Therefore, CEL is incorrectly not providing services to residents and in breach of the SoM.
Once we have a further update we will communicate the news as soon as possible.
If you have any queries, please feel free to get in touch.
Kind regards.
----------------------------------
Ashley Donoff
Chair of Huson Briary RA