Paying Rent
When should I pay my rent ?
Your rent is payable every Monday in advance. You can choose to pay monthly but you must still pay in advance.
How do I pay my rent ?
WPH offers a range of ways to pay your rent:
By payment card
All our customers are given a payment card (swipe card). With your card you can make payments at post offices and retail outlets displaying the PayPoint or payzone logos such as shops and garages.
Simply hand over your swipe card and your payment at the counter. If you are paying by cheque, please ask the counter staff who the cheque should be made payable to. Please note that you may not be able to pay by cheque at all outlets. At post offices you can use your payment card to pay by cash, cheque or debit card. Simply hand your swipe card with your payment to the counter staff. If you pay by cheque, make the cheque payable to Post Office Counters Ltd. The counter staff will give you a receipt.
You can also pay by cash, cheque or debit card using the post office’s Transcash system but they will charge a fee for this.
You can find details of outlets in your area on the internet at www.paypoint.co.uk/wherecanipay.htm and search.payzone.co.uk
Directly from your bank account
If you have a bank account, it’s easy and convenient to pay your rent by direct debit. If you would like to do this, please contact your local housing office or a council one stop shop for a direct-debit instruction form. Completed forms should be sent to WPH.
At you local housing office or the Conway Centre One Stop Shop
You can pay by cash or cheque at this office.
The Conway Centre One Stop Shop, Conway Street, Birkenhead (Mon–Fri 9am–5pm)
By post
If you pay by post, please make sure your cheque or postal order is crossed ‘a/c payee only’ and made payable to Wirral Partnership Homes. Then send it to our office at 6 Europa Boulevard, Birkenhead, Wirral, CH41 4PE.
By the internet
You can pay your rent on the internet either via this site, by logging onto www.billpayment.co.uk or via the Council’s online payment portal https://www.wirral.gov.uk/wpp/Rent.asp Remember to have your payment reference ready.
By phone
You can pay by phone using your debit or credit card. Phone Wirral Council on 0151 606 2002 between 9am and 5pm Monday to Friday. One of their customer advisers will take your payment and send you a receipt. Alternatively, you may pay via the Council’s 24 hour automated payment line 0151 606 2345. Remember to have your payment reference ready
Claiming Housing Benefit
Housing Benefit is provided to people on limited income to assist them with their rent payments. To receive housing benefit you must make a claim. To work out you’re your entitlement to housing benefit, the Council will need to proof of your income and savings.
If you are entitled to Housing Benefit, the HB section at Wirral will pay your rent direct to us. From time to time the Council will review your claim. It is essential that you co-operate promptly to a review or you could lose a significant amount of benefit. If you are overpaid you will have to pay the money back to the Council so, if your circumstances change, you must inform the Housing Benefit Section straight away on 0151 606 2002.
Click on the links below to open the following useful websites in a separate window:
Citizens Advice Bureau
The Department for Work & Pensions
Shelternet
Online Benefits Calculator
Entitled to
What if I can’t pay my rent?
If you are worried about not being able to pay your rent, it’s important to talk to us about it as soon as possible. It’s best to contact your housing office – they will do their best to help you with any problems.
If you have fallen behind with your payments, they can tell you about housing benefit and other benefits you may be entitled to, refer you to an independent advisor and agree with you a repayment plan that you can afford.
Welfare and Debt Advice
WPH understands that from time to time many of our customers will have problems with money and debt or with claiming benefits. Therefore, we have arranged with other organisations to give our customers easy access to specialist advice.
Debt advice
WPH, through an arrangement with Wirral Citizens Advice Bureau can get you an appointment to see a specialist money advisor to discuss any money problems you may have. Simply contact your income team to book appointment. Appointments are available each Monday afternoon at Moreton One Stop Shop, Thursday morning at Liscard Housing Office and Friday morning at Rock Ferry One Stop Shop.
Welfare benefit advice
If you are struggling with a claim for welfare benefit or would like some advice about whether you may be entitled to a benefit, we can arrange for you to see a welfare benefits advisor from a number of advice agencies. Currently these include:
· Mersey Advice , 4 St Anne Street Birkenhead (appointments also available at WPH,6 Europa Boulevard, Birkenhead)
· Tranmere Alliance, 225 Church Road, Tranmere
· Wirral Welfare Rights Unit, Conway Centre, Conway Street, Birkenhead
To book an appointment phone John Roach on 606 3145.
Housing benefit advice
If you have a problem with housing benefit, a call to the Council’s housing benefit service (0151 606 2002) or a visit to a Council One Stop Shop will often sort it out.
The WPH income teams can give you advice and help with housing-benefit claims. They can help you complete an application form and make enquiries for you about problems with your claim.
The various advice agencies listed in this leaflet can also help with housing-benefit problems.
Other advice agencies
Citizens Advice Bureau Advicelink
for Debt, Welfare Rights and Housing 0151 638 1313
50 Argyle Street, Birkenhead 0151 647 6517
57 New Chester Road, New Ferry 0151 645 8793
237 Liscard Road, Wallasey 0151 639 7858
1 Acacia Grove, West Kirby 0151 625 9802
6 Rock Lane, Heswall 0151 342 6371
Welfare Rights Unit, Conway Centre, Conway Street, Birkenhead 0151 666 4570
The Roundabout Centre, 349 Laird Street, Birkenhead 0151 652 9108
Mersey Advice, 4 St Anne Street, Birkenhead 0151 666 1999
Tranmere Alliance, 225 Church Road, Tranmere 0151 644 1100
Response (16-20 year olds) 0151 666 4123
Advocacy in Wirral, Woodside Business Park, Birkenhead 0151 650 1530
National Debtline 0808 084000
Shelternet
Support workers
If you receive help from a support worker, they may be able to help you or may be able to access specialist help for you.
WPH floating support service
Customers under 25 who are having difficulties maintaining their tenancy can get help and support from our floating support service. The team may be contacted on 606 3128.
What happens if you don’t pay your rent?
We expect all our customers to pay their rent in full and on time. If a customer has money difficulties and is struggling to pay their rent we will always try to help them find a solution. However, we cannot allow customers to leave their rent unpaid.
If you can’t pay your rent and are getting into arrears, we strongly advise you to speak to your income team. They may be able to agree an arrangement with you so that you can repay the arrears. If you don’t take steps to begin to repay the debt, we will have to take action.
What we will do if you don’t try to repay your rent arrears
If you don’t agree a repayment plan, we will serve you with a legal document called a ‘notice of intention to seek possession’. This tells you that we intend to take court action to gain possession of your home (take your home back). It also tells you:
- why we are seeking possession of your home; and
- that court action will not start until 28 days from the date of the notice.
You may be able to stop the court action going ahead if you contact us and make an agreement to repay the arrears.
What happens after the 28 days have passed?
We can apply to the county court for possession of your home any time during the 12 months after the 28 days’ notice. Once we have applied for possession, the county court will contact you to give you the date of the court hearing. The county court will send you a summons, which tells you that you must attend on the day. It will also send you a document called a ‘particulars of claim’, which gives our reasons for seeking possession of your home.
Even though court action is going ahead it is important that you continue to make any payments you have agreed to and keep in contact with our income team. They will explain what is happening and tell you the best thing for you to do.
Before you attend the court hearing, you should also get independent advice from the Citizens Advice Bureau, a solicitor or an advice agency.
If you have rent arrears because you aren’t receiving your full entitlement to housing benefit, talk to the housing benefit service and give them any information they ask for to sort out your claim.
If you clear the arrears and agree to pay the court costs (currently £100) we will probably stop the court action.
Attending the court hearing
Even if you have reached an agreement with us to pay off the arrears, it is still important that you attend the court hearing.
You can talk to our representative before the hearing to try to agree a payment arrangement to show the judge. You can also get an independent advisor to represent you in court.
At the hearing, the judge will consider the information you and WPH give.
The judge will reach a judgement (decision) based on what he or she thinks is reasonable.
What will be the outcome of the court hearing?
If the judge believes it is reasonable, he or she will grant us possession of your home and you will have to move out. The judge may decide to award us possession, but suspend the action. This means that as long as you pay your rent each week, plus a set amount off the arrears, you can stay in your home.
Sometimes the judge may decide to adjourn (postpone) the hearing, as long as you agree to pay your rent each week, plus a set amount off the arrears.
Unless we withdraw the action, you will have to pay our court costs, currently £100.
What if you don’t keep to the terms of a court order?
We will closely monitor your payments. If you don’t keep to the terms of a court order, we will contact to strongly advise you to make up the missing payment.
If you still don’t make up the missing payment, we can take action to enforce the order. If we do this, the court judgement will be recorded in the register of the county court judgements (CCJs), which will make it difficult for you to get credit for up to six years.
We can also apply to the county court bailiff for a warrant for possession. This means that once we have applied for the warrant, the bailiff would visit your home to serve you with a document called a ‘warrant of possession’. This will tell you that you are going to be evicted from your home and will give the eviction date.
For more information about eviction, please read our eviction leaflet or contact our income team.
When will WPH apply for an eviction?
We only evict tenants because of rent arrears, if we believe there is no alternative. This will be where, we believe that you are not living in the property, where you clearly lack the means to pay your rent or you where you have consistently failed to co-operate with us to clear the arrears by an agreed amount each week.
We see eviction as a last resort. We will go on trying to work with you throughout the eviction process to avoid you losing your home. However, it is important to know that we do evict a number of tenants each month.
Arranging an eviction
If you have broken the terms of a court order, we can apply to the court for a warrant to evict you from your home. This means we write to the county court bailiff to ask them to arrange an eviction date.
When we contact the county court bailiff, we will write to tell you. We will also ask you to contact us.
The bailiff will visit to serve you with the eviction appointment – this gives you notice of the date you will be evicted.
You should contact your income team immediately and also seek independent advice.
What can I do to stop the eviction?
If you pay off the arrears in full, and the court costs, the legal action will stop.
If you cannot pay off all the arrears, you should pay as much as you can and apply to the county court for a hearing. At the hearing you will be able to ask the court to suspend your eviction – that is, not to evict at this stage.
If you do apply to the county court for a suspension, you should also talk to your income team. You may be able to make an arrangement with them you pay your arrears. If you so, we will agree to the suspension.
You should also seek advice from the Citizens Advice Bureau, a solicitor or a welfare advice agency. If you are involved with social services or another agency, you should discuss the situation with your caseworker.
It is essential that you attend the hearing.
Will the court agree to suspend my eviction?
The court will listen to your reasons and ask us for our view before making a decision.
The court may do one of three things:
Refuse your application. If so, you must arrange to leave the property.
Agree to suspend the eviction and set a new order for paying off the arrears. Agree a short suspension to give you time to find somewhere else to live.
What if the eviction is to take place?
If the eviction is not suspended, you should arrange to move out of the property before the eviction date. You should empty the property and hand in the keys to the area office. If you leave belongings in the property, we will charge you the cost of getting rid of them. If you don’t hand in the keys, we will have to break in and we will charge you for repairing the damage this causes.
If you cannot find other accommodation, you should contact the Council’s Housing Advice Centre in the Conway Centre, Birkenhead. The Council is unlikely to take responsibility for rehousing you, but it can give you advice and assistance.
On the eviction day, at the specified time, the bailiff, a representative from our income team and a joiner will arrive and enter the property. You will have to leave the property at this time.
If you have not removed all your possessions, you may arrange with our income team to collect them from the property shortly afterwards. If you don’t collect the goods, we will thro them away.
What happens to the arrears after eviction?
The debt remains and we will keep applying for repayment. This could involve asking a debt-collection agency to collect the money.
If you fail to reduce the arrears you may be unable to get a new tenancy with WPH or any other housing association.