Comments on: Brighton Holiday Homes: a neighbour reflects…

By: Brighton holiday lets: thoughts on regulation and neighbourliness | Dan Wilson | Digital consultant, eBay expert, writer & blogger.

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 19:47:03 +0000

[...] my last post grumbling about Brighton Holiday Homes, I have been musing on what positive steps could be taken to improve the situation for the city's [...]

By: Michelle Stonehill

Michelle Stonehill — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 13:08:22 +0000

Sorry Dan. In our defence we were told it was eight mature language students, but you’re right it was an error of judgment. The house is set apart from the actual courtyard part of the mews and faces out into Lansdowne Place but we did misjudge it and we apologised for that at the time and changed it’s use to families/ corporate visitors. With regard to it being a holiday let and not adding to the community I suppose you need to talk to the owners. They have it as a holiday let because they use it themselves and do want to be part of the community when they are down. Seems unlikely now unfortunately.
Many of the larger holiday lets we manage which are used for hen/stag parties were run down student houses/sharers houses or housing association houses before so residents actually prefer it. Also they know that if a guest is noisy we can do something about it and they are there for a short time and not months on end. With a noisy long term tenant the process of diary keeping and ASBOs is very long and drawn out. No excuses for upsetting you though. Talk to the owners if you and everyone else wants a long term tenant instead and see what they say.

By: Michelle Stonehill

Michelle Stonehill — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:55:58 +0000

Just had another thought..you mention a problem with guests not being met at the property and you having to be a concierge. Guests are met at the property and are asked to call 20 minutes before arrival so that someone can meet them. Obviously we have to do this because with nearly 100 places we haven’t got the staff to be able to have someone waiting in a property for a guest to arrive.

Very occasionally the guests forget to do this and have to wait for one of our team to arrive. What we can do is put a security key holder outside so the guests can let themselves in and then wait for someone to come and greet them. This would solve that problem.

By: dw

dw — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:53:32 +0000

Where to start?

That you let a holiday home to 8 language students and didn’t think it worthy of your noise patrol shows a lack of judgement.

I can’t recall when I contacted you first, but know do know that other residents had been in touch over the course of the weekend and we’d heard nothing. We certainly never saw that noise patrol. I even went to the house itself to ask them to pipe down. But all that misses the main point.

This was a new party house that you’d established. We didn’t know who to contact. It’s all very well to say we should have done this or that. But among our many talents here, telepathy is still lacking.

How would we know who was in charge of the let? There is no sign on the building. There had been no letter informing us that the property was now a holiday let detailing the steps to take in the event of a problem. It was only that someone found the particulars for the property on your website that we made the link.

And anyway, why should we be doing your job for you? This is about pro-activity. You expect us to come to you, call you up, let you know. But at no point have Brighton Holiday Homes done anything to make that easy. And still we as a community get nothing from this arrangement. Your holiday let offers our street no amenity, no benefit but it has provided a bundle of annoyace. It’s just not a very good deal.

By: Chiis

Chiis — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:50:44 +0000

8 Students for a party in a three bed house? How does that work then – a couple in one room and ménage à trios orgies in the other two? Have to say I’ve never known a student party where the numbers didn’t instantly double or treble from those who officially booked. Drinking copious amounts invariably means no driving home before sobering up in the morning.

My belated 25 year late apologies to all the people we may have disturbed in my student days… but at least it was at holiday parks and not quiet residential streets where we ran amok!

By: Michelle Stonehill

Michelle Stonehill — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:34:51 +0000

Just need to add something to clarify a point. Where you say “It took days to get a response”.This is not actually true. We replied to your first contact by email the same day you emailed us. Looking at times it was five hours later but Catherine had spoken on the phone to Alice in the meantime. As I said though, please call me if there is anything else we can do and I am very sincere when I say I hope we can move on from this. Michelle

By: Michelle Stonehill

Michelle Stonehill — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:10:09 +0000

Hi Dan
Despite the personally insulting tone, I’m happy to respond. It simply isn’t true to say we don’t have a noise patrol. We do have a noise patrol for the very large group houses that accommodate hen and stag groups. This house didn’t fall into that category and was let to a group of 8 language students who had a Jubilee party. We first received an email from you on the Wednesday after the bank holiday and it was replied to with a sincere apology and with the number of the noise patrol given so that the future bookings could be monitored and dealt with. The office was open all over the weekend and had an answer phone emergency number for out of hours had you contacted us before. The following weekend you experienced a problem so we I hand delivered a letter of genuine regret and apology to all residents that we had misjudged the area and stated that the house would only ever be let to family groups of four in future.So it was exactly one week I believe since our first contact with you that the whole problem was resolved.
What underpins our business phiosophy is that we want to work with neighbours. We are on a learning curve and and one of the things we are going to do is put a notice in all new properties with our details on it so neighbours can see who is managing it. But we are responsible and our noise patrol even has a GPS tracker so we know where it is at any time.
The holiday homes industry is very important to Brighton, creates a great deal of jobs and helps secondary indusries to survive. I truly welcome neighbours coming to us when there is a problem and we do not want them to suffer in silence. We will always listen to them and respond as we did with you and try to resolve it very quickly, as we did for you.
I am sorry I have made you so angry about this incident that happened in the past. Although I have to say I am genuinely perplexed as to why you can’t move on when we have genuinely and sincerely apologised and resolved this very quickly. We have also improved our business as a result with the GPS tracker in the patrol car. I sincerely hope we can move forward and I understand you have only thrown insults because you are angry. Please call me if there is anything else I can do.