Best way to handle security problem caused by new tenant in same property

shoegirl

I've a bit of an unusual query here. I've been living in a Victorian conversion of a quite a lot of flats for a couple of years, with odd but very agreeable neighbours in the ajoining flats. However the 2 flats downstairs were vacated over the last couple of weeks and a new tenant moved into one of the downstairs flats.

Now the layout of the house is that most of the garden has been turned into a raised terrace that is only accessible to myself and the other 1st floor tenant, via 2 open metal bridges, each leading to a patio door and door sized glass window in each of our apartments. The ground floor apartments are effectively turned into basement and do not have access to the raised terrace, but they have a small space outside shared between 2 flats. However, between the two bridges leading onto our terrace is not blocked off, so technically, the downstairs tenants could access the terrace and bridges if they have access to a bridge.

This arrangement offers an extra degree of security to ourselves on the 1st floor as there are no levels on the 2 terraced houses on either side, which up until now made it impossible to scale the high walls that reach about 6 foot above the floor level of my floor and the bridge. This effectively means that there is a 2 storey drop on the houses on either side, which as you can imagine is quite reassuring if you have a not very secure glass patio at the back.

Now this morning I was horrified to find that the new tenant downstairs, in an intricate way that could only have been done by climing onto my bridge, had run an extremely long heavy duty coaxial cable (the kind you could probably hang yourself with), looped it through both bridges and literally about one foot from my back entrance had loosely thrown it over to the house next door, where presumably it "taps" into the cable or satellite service there. It feeds back through his window, which I might add is now permanently open.

Naturally I was extremely angry as the cable is just hanging loose over the wall, but secured at the ground floor level, and now makes it possible for somebody on the other side to scale the wall. And the point where they will arrive on scaling is literally a foot from my back entrance. So I cut free and removed all the cabling surrounding the bridge and from the top of the wall. Since I was neither informed nor consulted in this change to the materials of the area I occupy, I cannot see why I should not.

However, the tenant replaced the cabling later on, which I removed again, with an intention to call my landlady tomorrow get this sorted out. (If he wants to run cabling from his flat elsewhere he is welcome to do so in a way that does not open access for potential intruders to get over the wall into my place easily). The house which is he is "tapping" into is also rented but to another, unrelated landlord, and sorry to say, practically a shanty town, a permanent pile of broken glass at the front of the house where evicted tenants came to exact revenge, and the front door is basically wide open all day. And my neighbour has effectively thrown them a rope into their back garden leading directly to my back entrance!

Anyway I had a major confrontation with the neighbour who has done all this who only moved in a few days ago. He is claiming that the "landlord" gave him permission and even had the cheek to demand that I pay for his cabling! I told him under no account would i do so, that he had no right to run heavy loose cable from a neighbouring property right by my entrance in a way that weakened my security, and that if the landlady had indeed given him permission (at that moment I didn't think to add he would also need permission from the neighbours landlord to do the same, not that they would give a flying f**k) I would have at least been informed if not consulted of the change since it affects me.

Anyway, I am almost certain that he hasn't got permission from the landlady to do what he has done (I suspect he's chancing his arm there since he kept refering to the landlady as a "he", clearly not realising that the person who owns the property is female!) So my plan is to ring my landlady first thing tomorrow and ask that the cabling be removed entirely, that I am not happy at having unsecured cabling to run past my back door into external locations.

Anyway the question on this I have is that if my neighbour ignores my requests to secure (which would require it to be tacked against the 2 houses walls as the wall is about 100 years old) or remove the cabling, or if my landlady refuses to deal with the situation, what are my options? Right now I'm under part 4 after my initial fixed term expired, so normally I should give 56 days notice, but would this be considered a breach of tenancy (as the security I previously had is lowered) which would give me 28 days notice? Any ideas. I'm livid as its put me from being in a nice secure situation to basically really making it much easier to break into the house where I live, and my place unfortunately would be the first place a potential thief would reach (and to worsen things, I live in an area with very high crime, mostly car theft, but a degree of break-ins too, which being elevated was a slight protection from).

Any suggestions would be greatly welcomed.

Victor

Mention it to the landlord. Explain your concerns. Be direct and rational, not emotional.

Of course, if his window is always open, he is setting himself up as the target.

DublinDilbert

your reaction seems to be OTT... you'd be best trying to get along with your neighbors and discuss things in a rational manor a the correct time.

I've no idea of the setup, but a coaxial cable is unlikely to be able to hold the weight of a person....

Also what would stop someone coming a long with a rope and throwing it over your walk-way and climbing up it?

I think there would of been better ways to deal with this... even just suggest an alternative routing for the cable which avoids the problem altogether...

DublinDilbert

Victor wrote: »

Of course, if his window is always open, he is setting himself up as the target.

that's very true, they'll hit him first and he's ground floor and all....

shoegirl

DublinDilbert wrote: »

Also what would stop someone coming a long with a rope and throwing it over your walk-way and climbing up it?

A rope would need to be secured somewhere, otherwise it would just fall back. My problem was that the cabling was secured to the metal bridges just above his flat.

He would not be hit first, because anybody hopping the wall using the cable as a support would land at my patio entrance. However they would indeed be able to see that his window is wide open (which is a security hole in itself). They would have to climb down though through the gap in between the bridges, which would be a bit slow - far quicker to try breaking in to one of the two flats connected to the elevated area.

The landlady went mad anyway at the idea of someone running cabling to an ajoining house which is not owned by her in order to tap into services there. She knew nothing about it and is going to put a stop to it straight away.

kittenkiller

shoegirl wrote: »

The landlady went mad anyway at the idea of someone running cabling to an ajoining house which is not owned by her in order to tap into services there. She knew nothing about it and is going to put a stop to it straight away.

Glad to hear it.
I'd love to be a fly on the wall when he gets that call from her!

shoegirl

It actually turned out he'd run the cable across the backs of 3 different houses. Needless to say there were quite a few people "upset."

Apparently the landlady had agreed to him putting his own satellite dish outside but had no idea that he was going to start running cables across several other unrelated properties.

I suggested attaching it to the decking on the terrace (there is lots of room for that) so he will have to fork out for his own dish rather than tap into somebody elses.