[2024] UKUT 80 (LC)

This appeal is about the FTT’s decision in relation to service charges in the year 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022. One of the charges in issue is for work carried out in May 2021 to re-decorate the stairwell of the house at a cost of £3,880. It appears from the bundle that there was correspondence between the leaseholders before the work was commissioned about the need to carry out some decoration. I shall say more later about the significance of that email correspondence. After the work was done and service charges were demanded, Mr Atherden expressed concerns about the evidence provided of the landlord’s expenditure.

In the summer of the same year there was email correspondence about a leaky gutter, which was causing problems for Mr Atherden in the first floor flat and for Mr Daniel Anderson, another leaseholder. There was some disagreement about what was to be done and, again, I shall say more about the email correspondence later. Mr Atherden commissioned and paid for some work. He then took the view that that cost, £600, should be shared by the leaseholders as part of the service charge; Mr Bingham disagreed on the basis that it was not a charge that the landlord, by its shareholders, had agreed to incur.