Topic: Shooting the messenger

[digmore]

Why, when you warn someone that trouble is possibly coming their way, do they turn on you.

Council inspector came on site and took pictures of plots not up to scratch and said would be back to check in 3mths to see if any improvements made.

Why didn't you tell him..............etc. etc.

Well, its not my plot and its fore warned so fore armed.

Tell you what, deal with it yourself.

Digmore.

[manicscousers]

Wish there was a like button.
Getting seriously fed up telling people.Must be something to do with winter, roll on growing season

[gavinjconway]

We do an inspection every now and again and we look at the ones that are bad - and then send them letters. If it not any better in 30 days we send another final letter and then evict after another 30 days.. harsh but needed to keep the plots up to scratch. If they let us know of a reason that they cant get it sorted quickly we will give them a few more months to sort it out..

[digmore]

Gavin,
 
We do inspections fortnightly and the council quarterly, if the council have a concern, they tell us (The Committee) and we approach the tenant and then take the action required. Similar to yourselves.

But on this occasion the council man (new) jumped the gun.

Now that the council and we take photos, do people still think they can blag their way through.  Just do a couple hours work and the jobs done and everything is rosy.

So why, when you are trying to help and save someone from eviction do they get stroppy with the messenger.

Sadly, I can see why good men and women tend to keep themselves to themselves.

There is a saying, If your living on the edge, your taking up to much space. In allotment terms, if you don't want to do the job, don't be selfish, leave and let someone else have a go.

That's my cuff for the day, feeling better now. 

Digmore, 

[Unwashed]

Gavin,
 
We do inspections fortnightly and the council quarterly, if the council have a concern, they tell us (The Committee) and we approach the tenant and then take the action required. Similar to yourselves.

But on this occasion the council man (new) jumped the gun.

Now that the council and we take photos, do people still think they can blag their way through.  Just do a couple hours work and the jobs done and everything is rosy.

So why, when you are trying to help and save someone from eviction do they get stroppy with the messenger.

Sadly, I can see why good men and women tend to keep themselves to themselves.

There is a saying, If your living on the edge, your taking up to much space. In allotment terms, if you don't want to do the job, don't be selfish, leave and let someone else have a go.

That's my cuff for the day, feeling better now. 

Digmore, 

Digmore, you're running a service industry; if you're getting narked with people it's likely that's coming over to them too.  Service users can be unreasonable, it happens, but they deserve your respect all the same, even if they end up being evicted for poor cultivation.

If I had a council allotment and the committee came round once a fortnight taking photos of my plot I'd be very unhappy.  How would you feel if I came round to your house every fortnight and took a photo of your garden?  Don't think the two are comparable?  They are.  You have a right to privacy and the quiet enjoyment of your allotment, and fortnightly inspections is intrusive.

Dealing with stroppy customers isn't always easy, but that's what they are - customers.  It can be stressful for you, I understand that, but you need to understand it from the customer's perspective.  Mostly people are stroppy because they're angry or frustrated at what from their perspective is unreasonableness or unfairness, and in general people respond well if they're treated fairly and with dignity, and that usually starts with listening to them.

[bluecar]

Unwashed, I think you are being a bit harsh.

Digmore is not running a service industry. The council are running a service and that is a balance between the service to the allotment plotholders and the parishioners. The committee (amongst other things), it seems are just trying to pre-empt any problems that might arise between individual plotholders and the council. A fortnightly walk around the site by a couple of committee members does not seem obtrusive to me. They will pick up many aspects such as wind damage, attempted site break-ins etc, which may not be passed on by some plot holders. I do not think every plot is photographed every two weeks, indeed Digmore has stated that it is 3 months between the council photographs which is a very generous amount of time to wait for a plot improvement.

However, the main point as I see it, is that a friendly 'warning' to a fellow plotholder that the plot was probably not up to the required standard was poorly received and Digmore was 'shot as the messenger'.

Regards

Bluecar

[Unwashed]

Digmore asks why stroppy plotholders should turn on him.  I've given you an answer to that.

[Ellen K]

It's not a service at all.  The council are landlords and if they walk round the site and note that some plots are uncultivated or appear abandoned then they have a right to issue a warning or even evict tenants under the tenancy agreement we all signed.

But if a committee member told me that my plot was "not up to standard", well I don't see how that is "help" and I'd just tell them to mind their own business.  It's between me and the landlord.

[digmore]

There seems to been line of argument here that has gone off track. I made the comment, that sometimes, giving a word to the wise, gets the giver a hostile reaction.

Example, Excuse me, but welding next to that propane tank could be dangerous, Reply, whats it got to do with you. Nothing really, but it could blow your house up, tell you what, carry on, I will sit across the road and watch.

Digmore

[Unwashed]

You don't need to like my response digmore, but you did ask why you might get a hostile reception to your approach, and I've given you a plausible answer. 

You're providing a service, so think of yourself for example as shop-staff:  what kind of service do you expect in a shop?  What if you go into a shop to complain about something faulty you've bought, do you expect the shop staff to be understanding and listen to you, or would you be happy if they dismissed your complaint out of hand.  What if you're buying clothes and the shop staff tutted at your choice of shirt, would you be OK with that , or would you feel indignant.  What if you mistakenly left the shop with the shirt in your bag without paying, would you be completely understanding if the 6'8"" door manager knocked you to the ground and put your arm in a lock without first asking you to come back into the shop, or would you tell him what you thought about being assaulted without reason?

Your allotmenteers' plots are their own property, they are not the property of the landlord, and they are not the responsibility of the site committee.  Your allotmenteers will value their privacy and expect you to show respect for their ownership.  They may well be affronted to be told that what they're doing on their own property is not up to someone else's standards, and that feeling of indignation is likely to be very much stronger if you are not directly authorised by their landlord to enforce the site standards.

None of that means that allotmenteers can ignore legitimate cultivation rules, but it really would help to understand how your allotmenteers will see their plots, and if you're finding people responding defensively or aggressively it's a really good indication that you've not given them good customer service.

[Borlotti]

I don't own my allotment, it is rented to me by the Council, and under the terms and conditions I have to keep to them.  We have regular inspections and my allotment has got a bit overgrown, but some are much worse.  If I had to buy a house and garden in London with a great big garden I couldn't afford it, so I rent one from the Council.  Once a year non-cultivation letters go out, luckily I have not had one yet, but people that break the rules, should get a letter, and if they cannot deal with a site, which is a privilege, should give it someone who can and will enjoy it.  Maybe next year, it will be too much for me, and I will give it back to the Council.  Some people take the p ss and should have letters, and only come up 2 or 3 times a year and their allotments are a jungle. 
Unwashed, How can you own an allotment, it belongs to the Council or the landowner, so you have to agree to the rules.

[Unwashed]

Unwashed, How can you own an allotment, it belongs to the Council or the landowner, so you have to agree to the rules.

Actually if the council own the freehold of the allotment site and they lease you a plot what the council own is called the reversionary interest.  You don't own the freehold of course, you just own a lease on the plot, but that lease is property.

It's probably easier to understand how that works when you think about the situation when a council might lease the site from someone else, like a farmer or something:  as allotmenteers your landlord is the council and as far as you are concerned they have exactly the same rights and duties as if they owned the freehold, except of course the farmer might have imposed a few conditions of her own on the council which the council might have to pass on to you.  In the same way that the farmer leased the right to the exclusive possession of the site from the farmer, you lease the right of exclusive possession of your plot from the council.

Talking about land you're probably thinking of property as the soil and grass and all that physical stuff, but that's not property, property is the right to control that land.  As the leaseholder you have a right to the exclusive possession of the plot, and that right is greater than any right of the landlord to possess the plot - that's an inalienable and intrinsic property of a lease, that the tenant has exclusive possession.

If that sound's a bit odd it's helpful to understand that the freeholder typically doesn't actually own the physical stuff of their property, because since 1066 the Crown has actually owned most of England's green and pleasant land, it's just the freeholder has a better right to possess it than anyone else.  But the freeholder can sell that right of exclusive possession, and that's what property is, it's a right.

Yes, your right of possession if subject to some rules, but your allotment is still your property (and if you want the legal definition of that it's Section 1 of the Law of Property 1925 - a lease is a "term of years absolute").

Any landlord has a common law duty to allow their tenant exclusive possession and quiet enjoyment, but for Council landlords that is a statutory duty under Article 1 of the First Protocol of the Human Rights Act 1998:  "Protection of property.  Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his possessions. No one shall be deprived of his possessions except in the public interest and subject to the conditions provided for by law and by the general principles of international law."

So your plot is your property.

[daitheplant]

Here in Torfaen, the allotments are managed by the allotment holders in the form of two allotment groups. The sites are owned by the council, but are run by these two groups.  Because of this arrangement there are very few neglected plots.