A long-running dispute between the owners and the leasehold tenants of a holiday park near Padstow, Cornawall, has, finally, after an appeal by the owners, led to the tenants having their service charge increased by £8.38.
The dispute is between Martin and Rebekah Francis, the owners of the Atlantic Bay Holiday Park, St Merryn, and the leaseholders of the holiday chalets on the site.
The park is a 25-acre site on a former RAF base which was developed for holiday use in the 1970s. It includes areas occupied by permanent holiday chalets and lodges, and separate areas for touring caravans and a camping field.
The Francises, according to a judgment of the Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber), have been in dispute with the chalet owners over the service charge since they bought the site in 2008.
Over the years, according to the ruling, many of the chalet owners had refused to pay the service charge, so in January 2020 the Francises applied to the First Instance Tribunal to determine a reasonable figure.
And in September 2020 the tribunal found the reasonable figure for 2020 was £1,474.89 plus VAT, based on a total expenditure divided by 177 chalets.
The owners had recently built a single chalet divided into two for their two sons, who work as wardens on the site. The tribunal considered that to be two units, bringing the total number of units to 177.
The owners appealed to the Upper Tribunal and, in a judgment last week, Tribunal president Martin Rodger QC agreed the wardens’ chalet should be considered one unit, reducing the total number of units to 176.
This means that the service charge per chalet has gone up by £8.38 as a result of this ruling.
