Charges and Fees

If you are a Shared Owner, the rent you pay for your home will increase in line with your lease agreement. Under our contract with you we review your rent on 1 April each year and your rent would be adjusted in accordance with the review clause within your lease agreement.

Rents for most of our customers will increase in April in line with the provision in the lease for the majority of our properties.

This is a figure used to measure inflation; it reflects how much the price of common goods and services change over time.

Service charges pay for the cost of looking after a shared space beyond your own home. The service you receive will depend on where you live and what facilities are provided. Service charges recover the costs in providing services to a building and/or neighbourhood. How your service charge is worked out and what it covers is set out in your lease.

Service charges generally cover the cost of services such as grounds maintenance, communal/window cleaning, repairs, buildings insurance lifts, lighting and so on. Charges may also include a management fee provided by the landlord or a managing agent and contributions to a sinking fund.

Your lease details what the landlord can and cannot charge for and the proportion of the charge that you will have to pay. The landlord or a management company provides the services and you and any other homeowners pay for them.

We set a budget for your scheme each financial year, which runs from 1 April to 31 March for the cost of services within shared communal areas. As we don’t know in advance the exact amount it will cost us to provide services and repairs, Plumlife estimates the cost of services by looking at previous 12 months actual expenditure. We also consider any changes that we know about for the next 12 months when calculating this to allow for expected costs and any increases. This may include any anticipated inflationary changes, or changes in contract price or rates and any expected major repairs due in the next year.

Your service charge estimate is sent to you in February each year and the amount you pay during the year is based upon this estimate. Service Charges are variable, meaning they will go up and down each year depending on the amount spent on your block or development. Your estimate may increase some years or decrease in others.

At the end of the financial year, we carry out a reconciliation of the amount homeowners have paid during the year and the cost of providing services and repairs. We will then send you a summary of the accounts within 6 months of the year end.

Where we’ve spent less on providing the services than we’ve charged you, there will be a surplus on your service charge statement. This is also known as an underspend.

Where we’ve spent more on providing the services than we’ve charged you, there will be a deficit on your service charge statement. This is also known as an overspend.

The terms of your lease are followed to the determine the treatment of any surplus or deficit and how this is credited or debited to your account.

Every year we have the final year-end charges that are independently verified. The charges are validated by Chartered Accountants, Beever and Struthers. Under the terms of your lease, you are responsible for paying this charge.  You will receive a copy of the report for the scheme you live in when you are sent your final year-end account statement.

Admin fees are payable for services we provide which are outside the terms of your lease agreement. They are usually for services which are requested as part of a process, for example, a property re-sale, an approval of a mortgage or making home improvements and is usually not a regular service provided to all leaseholders.

We carry out annual benchmarking of our fees with other Housing Associations. We look at what other organisations charge and the services they charge for to make sure we are charging fairly for these extra services. Please click here for a list of our current administration fees.

Sinking Funds are used to save money towards offsetting the future expenditure of major repairs and maintenance for building components such as roofs, windows, or lifts. The aim of sinking funds is to avoid unexpected and large repair bills for homeowners. This fund will be built up to cover the cost of any major works and is also collected for cyclical works such as internal redecoration. We aim to review our data (known as stock condition surveys) every 5 years to ensure the correct amount is being collected.

If a major repair is required and there are funds available to either pay the cost in full or in part, the fund will be used. If there aren’t sufficient funds, then any outstanding costs will be passed on through service charges demands. You will receive an annual statement showing the balance and any transactions in your service charge accounts.

This cost relates to our fee for managing the services provided on your development. Some of the services it covers are;

• Financial Matters – preparation and distribution of all accounts and budgets, arranging resident meetings to discuss where requested, collection of service charges, setting up direct debit mandates, pursuing unpaid service maintaining financial records, organising payment of invoices for works at your scheme.
• Administration – responding to customer queries, administration of repairs, communicating with homeowners and other residents and ensuring that records are updated, provision of Out of Hours emergency cover, ensuring compliance with the provisions of all statutory legislation.
• Scheme Visits – where there are communal areas inspecting the building and estate areas and recording repairs as necessary, dealing with any issues that arise from the scheme visits, arranging the removal of items stored in communal areas.
• Contractors – arranging repairs and managing contractors, coordinating service and maintenance contracts, ensuring all contractors comply with health and safety legislation, creating specification and monitoring works.
• Health and Safety – ensuring the building complies with the latest Health and Safety regulations, ensuring legal signage is displayed, arranging Fire Risk Assessments.

If you are a homeowner, you may be charged a ground rent, if permitted in your lease. The ground rent amount can change, depending on how many years the lease has been in place.

For some shared ownership and leasehold properties, Plumlife Homes / Great Places Group remains the freeholder of the property. Under the terms of your lease, we are obliged to provide buildings insurance, and you are not able to opt out of the group buildings insurance policy.

You can find more information on buildings insurance by clicking here.

There are some Service Charges which you can claim with your rent for Housing Benefit. These are known as Eligible Service Charges. Service Charges you can’t claim with your rent for Housing Benefit are known as Ineligible Service Charges.

On your service charge estimate Eligible and Ineligible services will be clearly identified. For further information on this you can contact

If you’re struggling to pay your charges, contact our friendly team on 0161 447 5050 or email directory@plumlife.co.uk. We know that rising costs will be a significant challenge for many of our customers and we will be able to provide some helpful advice.

You will not have to complete a brand-new claim with the Department for Work and Pensions. Once we write to let you know of the new rent Universal Credit will prompt you in your journal after 1 April so that you can advise them of your new rent and service charge. This is the only time you need to respond about the new rent.

Get in touch with your local council to advise them of your new charges from 1 April.

Do not worry, your Direct Debit will be adjusted automatically. After we write to you at the end of February notifying you of your rent increase, we will adjust your Direct Debit and you will receive information from Allpay to confirm your new monthly payments. If you have a repayment plan for any arrears, we will add the additional amount onto your monthly Direct Debit total. We will amend your new payments in line with the new charge. If your account has an outstanding balance of £25 or less, we will collect this in your first Direct Debit payment in April.

If you pay by Standing Order, contact your bank to change the amount to your new charge starting from 1 April.

We are here to help. Contact your Income Officer if you have arrears on your account and want to discuss increasing your payments or Direct Debit to cover this debt.

You will receive information about your rent and/or service charge increase in February each year. The new charges will then apply from the beginning of April that year.

As outlined in your lease agreement, regardless of how many months, weeks or days you have been in your property, when it comes to service charges the full prior year’s surplus or deficit is carried over to the new budget and is credited or debited to the new owner.

This is standard practice in the sector if the Housing Association operates a variable service charge regime; as a landlord we are entitled to recover our full service costs as long as they are reasonably incurred.

It could be for several things, including (but not limited to) the list below:

– Door entry systems

– Internal Lighting/Emergency lighting

– Appliances

– CCTV

– Fire alarms

– AOVs (Automatic Opening Vent smoke control system)

– Gates

– External street lighting

If you require clarification on the electricity charge you have received, please contact your Property Manager in the first instance.