Julia Beer & Anor v Daisy Dance & Anor

Introduction

1. This is an appeal from a decision of the First-tier Tribunal in relation to service charges payable under long leases of flats in 22 Craufurd Rise, a building converted into five flats. The appellants Ms Julia Beer and Mr Derrick Timms are the freeholders of the building, while the first respondent Ms Dance holds the lease of flat 1 and the second respondent Mr Sandhu is the leaseholder of Flat

4. Neither party was legally represented in the appeal. The legal context

2. The leases of flats 1 and 4 contain the usual provisions for the freeholder to maintain the building and for the leaseholder to pay a service charge in reimbursement of the cost of doing so. Section 27A of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 gives the FTT jurisdiction to determine whether service charges are payable and if so in what amount and to whom.

3. Section 20 of the 1985 Act, and the regulations made under it, provide for a consultation process to be followed in respect of major works costing more than £250 per leaseholder in any one year; if the statutory process is not followed then the landlord can recover only £250 from each leaseholder in the relevant year. The procedural background

4. In 2021 Ms Dance, the first respondent in this appeal, made an application to the FTT for a determination as to whether service charges were payable in relation to a number of years, from 2013/14 to 2021/22. Numerous charges were in dispute, relating to insurance, management fees, electricity and roofing works among others.

5. At paragraphs 3 to 37 of its decision, dated 3 February 2022, the FTT set out the “background facts” relating to work carried out as far back as 1991. At paragraphs 30 and following the FTT stated: “30. On 23 January 2021 the [landlords’] associated company emailed all lessees enclosing a section 20 notice for “repairs to roof.”

31. It is in turn alleged by [Ms Dance] that she suggested contractors, who were not suitable in the eyes of [the landlord].

32. On 11 May 2021 [Ms Dance] issued this application…

33. [The landlords] then obtained quotes in respect of repairs to the roof on or about 14 March 2021.

34. On 30 April 2021 [the landlords] email to the lessees purportedly to comply with stage 2 of the section 20 consultation process, enclosing quotes for roof repairs.

35. On 7 July 2021 [the landlords] obtained yet another quote in respect of repair to the roof.

36. On 2 August 2021 [the landlords] purported to levy additional service charges of over £46,000 un relation to the building works for the roof.”

6. At paragraph 51 the FTT said this: “At the hearing it also emerged that [Ms Dance] wished to advance a more expansive claim, to include a challenge to a roofing cost of £46,035, on the grounds of alleged lack of a section 20 consultation in 2021. This was not disclosed with any clarity on the face of the application, nor had the parties’ evidence been properly directed to it. The Tribunal determined that, if the Applicant wished to pursue that issue, she would need to issue a second application, possibly in conjunction with any other leaseholder who supports her. The main reasons for that determination were (1) the obvious prejudice to [the landlords] in facing a challenge which was not particularised adequately either in law or in fact on the face of the application, and (2) the lack of Tribunal time …to consider it.”

7. It appears, therefore, that the events that were described by the FTT at its paragraphs 30 to 36 were the subject of dispute between the parties. The landlords (the present appellants) took the view that they had complied with the consultation requirements and the tenant, Ms Dance (the present first respondent) said that the requirements had not been complied with. There was no dispute about the facts set out at paragraphs 30 to 36; the issue was whether the landlords had complied with the statute. The FTT at its paragraph 51 declined to decide that issue because it had been raised too late and directed Ms Dance to make a separate application if she wishes to pursue that challenge.

8. That is what Ms Dance and Mr Sandhu did in February 2024, and it is the FTT’s decision on that application, dated 6 March 2025 following a hearing on 13 February 2025, that is now appealed.

9. The 2024 application again sought to challenge a number of charges, this time relating to roof repairs, drains and management fees. The roof works had not, it seems, cost £46,000; I was told that they cost £15,480. The charges demanded of the two leaseholders in total were £4,876 for 2021/2022 and £2,016 in 2022/23. The leaseholders’ case was that the section 20 procedure had not been followed and that therefore they should each have to pay only £250 in each of the two years. The FTT agreed. It said that while Ms Beer, who represented the freeholders, maintained that the section 20 process had been followed she was unable to point in the bundle to the evidence that the process had been followed. Therefore, whilst it was satisfied that the works had been carried out it was not satisfied that the consultation process had been followed and allowed only £250 per leaseholder per year.

10. That is the decision now appealed, with permission from this Tribunal. The appeal

11. In the appeal the appellants say that they were sent the hearing bundle by the respondents very shortly before the hearing on 13 February 2025, and that it was not paginated and they could not find their way round it. Ms Beer says that when she was asked at the hearing to point to the material evidencing consultation in the FTT bundle she was not able to do so. In their grounds of appeal the appellants say that there was a procedural unfairness to them, and ask permission to adduce the email correspondence that they say comprised the section 20 consultation.

12. Written representations from the respondents did not engage with the issue of procedural unfairness and said nothing about the contents of the bundle.

13. The appeal bundle included the bundle that was before the FTT; it included the FTT’s decision of 3 February 2022 in which the events said by Ms Beer to comprise the consultation were set out (paragraph 5 above), but did not include the emails referred to at paragraphs 30 and 34 of that decision. At the appeal hearing I asked Ms Beer whether the FTT was referred to the decision of 3 February 2022 at the hearing on 13 February 2025, and she thought it had not been.

14. The respondents accepted that they had had difficulties in putting the bundle together. They very helpfully agreed that paragraphs 30 to 36 of the FTT’s 2022 decision were not discussed at the hearing on 13 February 2025, and that by oversight they did not include in the bundle the appellants’ emails referred to at paragraphs 30 and 34 of that decision. They maintained that the consultation process had not been properly followed but admitted that the documents that should have been shown to the FTT were not in the bundle and that they had not drawn the FTT’s attention to the findings of fact made in 2022.

15. In light of that I do not need to address the application to adduce fresh evidence on appeal. The appeal turns on the clear procedural irregularity: the respondents did not put in the FTT bundle, or bring to the FTT’s attention, the documents relied on by the appellants as constituting the section 20 consultation. Ideally the appellants would have asked for those documents to be included, or produced them at the hearing, but they were not able to do so because of the confusion caused by the late production of a poorly-organised bundle. Conclusion

16. There was a serious procedural irregularity because the FTT was not able to take relevant material into consideration when deciding whether consultation had taken place. Its decision, on that point only, is set aside and the matter is remitted to the FTT.

17. If the respondents wish to pursue their challenge to the service charges relating to the roof works they should ask the FTT for directions for a fresh hearing. It will be important for them, and for the appellants, to take great care to ensure that the bundle is complete and that all the relevant material is brought to the FTT’s attention. Upper Tribunal Judge Elizabeth Cooke 2 February 2026 Right of appeal  Any party has a right of appeal to the Court of Appeal on any point of law arising from this decision.  The right of appeal may be exercised only with permission. An application for permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal must be sent or delivered to the Tribunal so that it is received within 1 month after the date on which this decision is sent to the parties (unless an application for costs is made within 14 days of the decision being sent to the parties, in which case an application for permission to appeal must be made within 1 month of the date on which the Tribunal’s decision on costs is sent to the parties).  An application for permission to appeal must identify the decision of the Tribunal to which it relates, identify the alleged error or errors of law in the decision, and state the result the party making the application is seeking.  If the Tribunal refuses permission to appeal a further application may then be made to the Court of Appeal for permission.