Instructing a High Court Enforcement Officer to evict a tenant

This article deals with Instructing a High Court Enforcement Officer to evict a tenant.

Key points:

• Before Instructing a High Court Enforcement Officer to evict a tenant  you first need to apply for a Possession Order from your County Court.
• There are two types of bailiffs available to you: the County Court’s bailiffs, or High Court Enforcement Officers (HCEO’s).
• The County Court’s bailiffs’ eviction costs are much cheaper, but the process takes far longer due to the Court’s long waiting-list.

Choosing a bailiff

Once you have been to Court and received a Possession Order, you have two options: you can use the County Court’s bailiffs to evict your tenants, or High Court Enforcement Officers.

The main difference between the two is that, whilst far cheaper, the County Court’s bailiffs can take months to carry out an eviction due to the Court’s long waiting lists – especially if your property is in the South. Our High Court Enforcement Officers on the other hand can carry out an eviction in as little as four weeks.

Of course, the choice is yours, though we do strongly recommend you instruct a High Court Enforcement Officer if your property is in the South of England, or you have reason to believe your tenant will be uncooperative.

How to instruct  a High Court Enforcement Officer to evict a tenant at Quality Bailiffs

The N244 form

If you wish to instruct a High Court Enforcement Officer to carry out the eviction, you first need permission to transfer your case up to the High Court. To do this, you or your solicitor will need to complete the N244 form.

Do not worry if you have trouble filling in the N244 form; as part of our service, our operations team can go over the form for you to make sure it is viable for Court, and they can even complete it on your behalf.

Obtaining the Writ of Possession

Once the N244 form has been completed, our operations team will send it off to the Court. The Court will review your case and if successful, permission to transfer your case up to the High Court will be granted in the form of a Writ of Possession. It is this Writ of Possession which allows you to instruct High Court Enforcement Officers.

How long does the “transfer up” process take?

The “transfer up” process can take anywhere between four to six weeks: it depends entirely on how fast the Court grants the permission to transfer up.

Serving the Notice of Eviction

As soon as we receive the Writ of Possession, we will issue a Notice of Eviction to your tenant within 1-2 days, giving them 14 days to evict the property. If they have not left by the time this expires, you can Instruct a High Court Enforcement Officer to evict a tenant from the property.

If your tenant is being uncooperative on the day of the eviction, our Enforcement Agents are allowed to use reasonable force to remove them.

Applying for a combined Writ of Possession and Control

If your tenant is behind on rent or has caused considerable damage to your property, you can apply for a combined Writ of Possession and Control; this will allow you to not only evict the tenant, but also collect any rent arrears or money owed for damages to the property.

This service costs an extra £90 which, if successful in recovering the money, is added to the tenant’s debt meaning you would get this £90 back!

Have another question?

Read our FAQs on instructing a bailiff to evict a tenant here, or get in touch using the contact details below!