Recovering commercial rent in Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton and the Black Country carry one of the densest concentrations of small manufacturing and trade property in the country, much of it in older buildings on sites that have been industrial for well over a century.
Industrial and trade units run through Bilston, Willenhall, Wednesfield, Darlaston and the Black Country Route corridor. Retail sits around the Mander and Wulfrun centres and Dudley Street. Office stock is limited and concentrated in the city centre.
These units generally hold stock, tooling and plant, which makes the Black Country a strong market for taking control of goods. The recurring complications are financed machinery and the informal sharing of older buildings.
What tends to matter locally
Subdivision is the practical problem. A great deal of the older stock has been split between occupiers without the leases catching up, and taking control of goods requires knowing whose goods they are and which premises they sit in.
Machine tools are very often on hire purchase or lease. On a Willenhall or Darlaston unit that can account for most of what is on the floor, and none of it can be taken into control.
How quickly we can be there
We aim to be with you within two hours, though being straight about it, that is rarely what decides the outcome: the compliance stage runs from the office, and the tenant first gets a written Notice of Enforcement with fourteen clear days to run before anybody attends. Most commercial arrears are settled inside that period without an attendance at all.
Where an attendance is needed in Wolverhampton we plan it around the occupier rather than around our diary, and we say honestly beforehand whether the goods on site are likely to justify the visit.
The statutory fees
Under the Taking Control of Goods (Fees) Regulations 2014 the fees are fixed by statute: a £79 compliance fee when the Notice of Enforcement is issued, and a further £247 plus 7.5% of anything above £1,900 if an enforcement visit becomes necessary, with the full statutory scale set out in full separately.
Those figures are fixed by regulation, not by us, and they are the same in Wolverhampton as anywhere else in England and Wales.
Before you instruct us
Two things decide whether CRAR can be used at all:
- The lease must be a commercial one, in writing, with no part of the property let as a dwelling.
- At least seven days' rent must be outstanding, net of VAT, interest and any deduction the tenant could properly claim, which is the statutory minimum under section 77(3) of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007.
If both hold, we can usually have a Notice of Enforcement out the same working day we are instructed.