Student Accommodation is a shambles!
Wednesday, December 12, 2012Student accommodation what can I say. It has it's good points but it also has very irritating bad points.
I am currently an undergraduate Journalism student at the University of Ulster. I am based at the Coleraine Campus. I currently live about two hours away from the University so for inconvenience and also the experience of living in halls I decided to move to Coleraine and live in student accommodation. I chose Cranagh Village, yes it's the dearest out of all the accommodation at £94 a week but it's the only accommodation with it's own en-suite therefore it was the perfect halls for me.
Cranagh Village, Coleraine.
I arrived at Cranagh at the start of September 2012. My first impressions was that it was very basic. I didn't expect much especially as it was student accommodation. Every year for new students arriving the place is meant to be cleaned, re-painted and repairs are meant to be made from the year before. After a few days of staying in Cranagh I noticed that this hadn't been the case. There was writing on my walls, above my headboard and drips on the wall. This all clearly showed that the room hadn't in fact been re-painted at all. After using my shower I noticed that my extractor must not be working as the steam in the tiny bathroom was making the walls and floor damp. This is a serious worry as it can cause damage to the walls and ceiling and also is very unhygienic. Also in order to meet the statutory fitness standard, as amended by the Housing (NI) Order 1992, a property must; have adequate provision for lighting, heating and ventilation. I have no ventilation hence why there is damp in my bathroom. I also noticed when using my taps that my hot water tap was pretty much coming off. Every time I turned it on the whole tap and sink would shake.
My flatmates also made me aware of the problems they were having in their rooms. One of my flatmates window in her bathroom was not closing properly therefore making her bathroom and bedroom extremely cold..and living in the North Coast in chilly Coleraine you need all the heat you can get. After numerous times of complaining to the accommodation office, the window problem finally got resolved and it took less than an hour to fix. Why this wasn't resolved before we moved in I don't understand. My other flatmate also noticed that her heating was not working in her room. I personally experienced the coldness of Becca's room and it was not pretty. It was just as bad as being outside in Coleraine over the chilly winter months..oh and it's been about -3 in Coleraine recently so you can imagine how cold it has been. How Becca is expected to work and revise in those conditions is ridiculous. Becca complained yet again to the accommodation office, which can I also say is a shambles. Every time you go to complain they just shove a huge 'complaints book' in your face. It's like they don't even care. Sorry but I'm paying £94 a week for this accommodation..I will complain all I want. After a few weeks a repair man finally came and looked at Becca's radiator. They obviously noticed there was a problem but as of this day the heater in Becca's room still hasn't been fixed. Becca is still suffering the excruciating coldness.
On top of all of these problems we found an even greater one. We had the worlds most dangerous oven. Honestly it was atrocious that they even let us arrive and use the oven the way it was. You could clearly see by looking at the knobs on the oven that it was not working right. The area where the knobs are was black, obviously where the heat from the oven had been burning the panel where the knobs are. It got worse. One of my flatmates was cooking her dinner and was just about to take the tray out with a tea towel and the tea towel went up in flames and burnt the tea towel. This made us realise that this needed to be sorted and it needed sorted asap. The scenario with our oven was probably the biggest shambles ever. We told them our problems with the oven and they told us that they would order us a knew one. As a flat we were over the moon, however 2 weeks went by and we received a letter stating that our oven had been ordered and would be with us shortly but in the meantime not to use the oven. 6 weeks later, no oven. Absolute disgrace. What they expected us to cook we will never know. Legally according to NI Direct 'A landlord is responsible for the safety of gas and electrical appliances' Our oven eventually arrived after complaining yet again to the accommodation office. We were constantly having to bombard them with our complaints in order for action to be taken. As a landlord they should be making sure these serious and especially dangerous problems are resolved asap as this is their responsibility.
Me and my flatmates live in Flat 4 out of a block of 6 flats. We are one the first floor which is not bad it doesn't really affect me. It's one of those things you have to get on with when your living in flats. Also with an intercom in the flats it's easy to let people in without having to go the whole way downstairs. Well, that's what luxury others had in the block. For Flat 4, our intercom hadn't worked since we got here. Yet again, we were told everything had been checked and repaired. We again complained to the accommodation office. One day we noticed the phone from the intercom had gone. We were hoping that it had been taken away to get fixed. A few weeks went by an no one came back to repair our intercom. We then complained again..a repair man eventually came and fixed the intercom and had it fixed in about 20 minutes. It wouldn't have took much to have fixed this before we arrived. I think they forget that we are paying £94 a week to stay here which is an extortionate amount of money for students. We deserve to have our basic needs met considering we are paying for it.
Myself and the rest of my flatemates have a peaceful state of mind as we are not the only ones with these problems. Some students have vented their issues through Facebook on the Residential Services page. Issues mentioned on the page were: lack of heating and hot water, mould and damp.
Mark McVeigh, 18, from Newry is currently studying Business with Retail is in his first year at the University of Ulster. Mark also lives in Cranagh and has had problems with the accommodation since he first moved in. Mark told me that in his flat there is mould on his bathroom walls, paint flaking off the walls and his kitchen walls are covered in stains. Mark added 'I was very angry when a cleaner had told me that that place had been re-painted before our arrival because if this had of been the case
the new paint should have covered these stains & my bathroom
walls wouldn't be flaking off!'
Mark also went onto say that that one Thursday night his bulb blew in his room. Mark said he was told that someone would come and repair this on Monday. Mark said "I leave for home at the weekends so I was annoyed at the fact
that I would have to pack my suitcase by propping my bedroom door open to allow
light into the room."
Mark also told me about the recent problem of hot water at Cranagh Village. "Many students have had
no hot water off and on again for a number of weeks. This week my flat was
affected. On Tuesday I woke up and went for a shower during the hours when we
are supposed to have hot water and was shocked to find it ice cold.This
problem has only been fixed recently however I am uncertain as
to how long it will last as some flats supposedly had hot water last night and
none again this morning."
"I would not consider staying in Cranagh for a second year and while I
have made great friends and memories here that is the only reason I would
recommend it to anybody else. It is nearly certain that some of these problems
will be encountered again next year." concluded Mark.
Personally I have had some great experiences and memories in my first semester in Cranagh. However these on-going problems do put a bit of dampener on things. Were paying an extortionate amount for halls and I feel that we should definitely be better treated. Just because were students doesn't mean we don't care what conditions we are living in.
Hopefully the Residential team will take on board some of the things that have been said this semester and hopefully the new year will bring new improvements..here's hoping!
Hopefully the Residential team will take on board some of the things that have been said this semester and hopefully the new year will bring new improvements..here's hoping!
Let me know what your accommodation is like if your living in halls for uni? I would be really interested to know. Tweet me @GemmaTaggart or leave a comment below.
10 comments
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