A RADIAN Housing Association tenant has decided to withhold her rent after living without heating or hot water for months.

Barry Peterson told the Alton Herald that his granddaughter, Amy Goodyear, 21, has decided to deliberately keep back two weeks rent after repeated promises from Radian to fix the ongoing faults.

The issue began last August when Miss Goodyear moved into the property, at 15 School Fields, Kingsley, only to discover that the underground heating system didn’t function properly. As such, she has lived without central heating for the past 15 months.

And recently the problems worsened still as, since June, she has also had no hot water.

With winter fast approaching and no solution in sight, she made the decision to voluntarily enter rent arrears to put pressure on Radian.

Mr Peterson said that the housing provider “failed to mention” the ongoing faults when his granddaughter moved in and, despite numerous complaints and technicians visiting “20 to 30 times”, the problem hasn’t been resolved.

“They gave her three electric heaters, which meant that her electricity bill doubled in a week,” he added.

It is his suspicion that Ms Goodyear, who works full-time and doesn’t have any children, isn’t considered a priority.

This, on top of the fact that “communication (with Radian) is very, very poor”, has made the saga “extremely frustrating”.

But he explained that “luckily” he also lives in Kingsley and is able to help – with his granddaughter visiting to bathe and shower.

“She has to warm up in our house,” he added. “She rarely stays in her house in the winter as it’s too cold.”

Now they are “waiting with bated breath” as Radian is again due to repair the problem next week.

A Radian spokesman said having been unable to fix the heating faults which affect a number of properties at School Fields, they will replace it entirely.

“When any of our residents report faults with their heating systems we undertake necessary repairs and provide temporary heating where necessary,” he said.

“Some of the issues at School Fields have been due to the system working in a different way to conventional systems and our energy advisers have offered advice and guidance to residents which resolved a number of the issues which they have raised.

“Despite our best efforts and significant investment in repairs, we have decided to replace two systems (including the system at number 15) where there have been ongoing technical issues.”

And the spokesman added: “We are reviewing what action to take in respect of the other properties as some of our residents really like their heating systems and have reported few, if any, problems.”