More than £1.5million of unpaid rent racked up by nearly 3,500 former council tenants is being written off. Bristol City Council cabinet members agreed that officers should give up trying to chase the debts, which are all over three years old.
No payments have been made by any of the 3,446 ex-tenants in the last 12 months – each owing an average of £446 – and the money is now considered unrecoverable and accounted for in the authority’s budget. A report to cabinet said the current outstanding total debt for the council’s housing revenue account (HRA) was £13.1million, of which £8.5million related to current tenants rent arrears.
It said: “A review of debt older than three years has been undertaken for which there has been no activity or payments during the last 12 months. Reviewing this historic debt and considering the likelihood of collecting it, it is considered better value for money to direct resource to manage £8.5million of current tenant priority debts and other active debts.”
