Thanks for all the replies guys. We always do take out rent insurance nowadays, now the interest are going up its more tight on the mortgages vs rent, but for some reason when we got this a year or so back we didn't take this insurance out for this particular property (a overlooked aspect on our behalf which is biting us up the arse now!) its a bloody nice apartment as well opposite the carlsberg factory if anyone knows it, new belway site.

Will see how it goes over the weekend, and may have to make some 'arrangement' have seen some lads tonight and told them about this little issue and they are up for helping, so reckon that might do the trick.
I have a friend who has had this issue a lot, and he suggested, simply send them a letter and tell them to fook off, and then change locks etc if they don't respond. Never had to change locks etc before.

I remember some years ago when i first got involved in this game, we had a problem tenant in Bham and we simply lost contact with the person, we ended up going round and forcing the locks, and found she had off anyway, were there clearing up and the police turned up looking for her, so seems we weren't half her problems after all.

I just can't believe the tenants have more rights in all of this, like i said before it should be in the contract that if rents aren't paid, they have no contract therefore no rights, and are therefore trespassing and the police should be able to get involved and turf them out. Wouldn't mind paying for this service even, as lost rent is money out of our pocket to be fair..

Makes my blood boil, thinking the scumbags are sitting in my flat right now at my expense.. bastardios..
is there any company that specialises in harrassing non paying tenants until they leave, if not why not, am sure there is a massive market for this with the booming buy to let industry!

Oh, well after a bit of searching on good old google..
This is what i've come across..

Like Step 3.. would love to go down and watch this happen!

http://www.clicktoevict.co.uk

Seems someone else had the same idea!! cool.. may give this a try or try the direct approach. If the cheeky ask for their deposit back, ill ask them for a forwarding address and then i can have some fun!

Luckily property inspections have all been fine to date, nice and tidy, just seems they don't like paying for the privilege of living there.. scrotes.. what i would do if you put me in a dark alley with them armed with a bat.

KAM - luckily never suffered this fate myself - out of interest what deposits do you take - 1 month or two? I have leant towards 2 these days for increased safety net - two is OK but more is considered a sureity and handled differently - may not help now but could in future - best of luck and keep us posted.

Got 4 big lads working in Northampton this week, pm me if you need some help

Thanks guys, well we normally take whatever the letting agent tells us to, i.e. their company policy, although we do insist that we want to hold the deposit not them, we had an incident a year or so back when a tenants deposit was released despite the inventory check not being carried out properly and when we retook possession it became clear loads of stuff in the fully furnished place was missing! great.. not leaving that to an agent again..

We're moving away from private tenants more nowadays and more towards DSS tenants, they really are less hassle, and easier to deal with. To be honest ive been really busy today so not had chance to check the latest on this, but AndyS your offer may be a lifesend.. although despite thinking about this before, it may become problematic if i take the aggressive route, although i would like to. We have an unspoken rule between our family, we all kind of split the load automatically and take care of certain properties ourselves, not really taken too much notice of this one before, but it really does wind me up when i feel like we're being taken for mugs.. specially by some low life scum that can't even afford their rent! If it was round the corner, would have been round there in an instant, but work commitments mean i can't really get down to northampton any time this week.. hmm .. looks like i'll have to leave it to this agent or another organisation..