Bully-boy landlords

My landlord served me seven days notice the other day because I'm in arrears - I wasn't especially worried as he often says this. The amount we're talking about is less than £150!

When I say landlord, I mean one of the two managers of the place where I live. I live in a Bed and Breakfast cum hostel. The deal is that Housing Benefit pay my rent and I pay a surcharge on top of that of £25 per week. This is to cover electricity, heating, hot water and breakfast. (Breakfast is two sausages, two eggs, baked beans and two toast.)

The next time I saw this man he assured me he meant it "this time". It wasn't until I spoke to one of the security people on the front door who forewarned me that Mr X was really gunning for me and had spoken to the lawyers that I became alarmed.

So I took myself down to the jobcentre to use their free phones and phoned the advice people at Shelter. I knew I had very few rights as I only had a licence to live in my room, nothing like a tenancy. I was under the impression that due to the length of my stay, my landlord had to give me more than a week's notice.

When I got through and spoke to one of Shelter's advisers she quickly disabused me of this notion. I didn't have a legal leg to stand on - I had no more rights than a guest in a hotel who hadn't paid the bill! The adviser was able to give chapter and verse on the small claims court in terms of getting my stuff back, and also to point me in the direction of Community Legal Advice for any future difficulties.

So I went back to my room, packed up three boxes of important bits and pieces, stashed these in the room of one of the few people in my B and B I can call a mate, along with my suit and a leather jacket. I  then wrote a careful note to the landlord with future payment dates and pondered my lot.

The thing that really pissed me off was that it was so arbitrary, that I could become homeless on just the whim of someone else! Come the morning, nothing happened.