Topic: Pay your rents

[Unwashed]

In Newbury bills are sent out in February with rents due March 1st.

[picman]

Great response ,,, cheers  , I have a good picture of the pay days now , It is amazing all the different setups we have up and down the country , what seems to be important is a band of hard working  committee + members  to get stuck in and make whatever system is imposed on them.... work.

Many thanks . Les 

[Paulh]

Ours is paid in October.  We got it changed 3 years ago.  Reason being, when it was paid in April, by the time you finished chasing people who never paid and had to serve notice, it was June before the plot could be reallocated and the weeds were usually several feet high by this stage.  Allocating in October means if we have to serve notice we can still allocate whilst the plot is dormant and newbies have a couple of months before the sowing and planting season to prepare the allotment for how they want it, instead of trying to clear, sow, dig and plant at the same time.  it can all be a bit daunting for newbies so slow time preparation is a good thing.  This has certainly been to the benefit of the site and it now remains relatively clean.  October is also the time when plotholders tend to give up their allotment, after they have harvested the majority of crops.  Works well for us and I would recommend it.

The council allotments here have 01 October as the start of the year, which in theory allows them to do as you say. In practice, with several wet winters / springs they've been reluctant to evict those who (fairly) say it has been too wet to tackle their plots, so many are rather a mess now. I'm hoping that, with our plotholders association helping, we will be able to get this addressed this season. We've got waiting lists, so those who aren't going to use their plots should now move on.