Door-to-door rent collection was once
the mainstay of housing management
but it is fast becoming a thing of the
past. Paul Humphries asks whether we
should mourn or celebrate
Brass in
pocket
22 Inside Housing 1 July 2005
The image is of a man in a gabardine, money satchel secured across his
body, trudging door-to-door. He knocks at a house and shouts ‘Rent!’ and
receives the retort ‘Spent!’
That’s how the artist Reg Smythe depicted the rent collector in his
famous long-running Andy Capp cartoon series in the Daily Mirror and it’s
an image that sticks.
But few of us get to see a rent collector of any description these
days. Where once they were a common sight throughout the UK, the
onward march of direct debits and electronic money transfers, along
with an increase in the number of violent robberies, have seen numbers
drastically fall and they are now becoming a rarity.
But down the years rent collectors have been an important part of
society, even recognised by Victorian philanthropists as a perfect tool to
gain an insight into the underclass of the day and help right some of the
wrongs being suffered.
To this day, there are those who argue that rent collectors play an
important social role and that their regular visits, especially to the homes
of elderly people, help combat social exclusion.
Indeed, rent collectors themselves were always aware of their value
to a community. When Taunton Deane Council started the process of
stopping door-to-door rent collection in 2002, one of the rent collectors
wrote to the housing committee asking them not to go down that road.
Even though he knew he was not going to lose his job but be
transferred elsewhere, he still pleaded with the council to retain doorto-door collection. He said it was a valuable service to the community
and though it carried a threat of danger to the collector, he and his
colleagues accepted the risk.
But the council had been advised by the police the service was
becoming a crime hazard and, coupled with more tenants opting out of
this form of payment, Taunton Deane turned down the collector’s plea.
It was not only the police that were advising against door-to-door
collection at this time. Zurich Municipal, the major insurance company in
the local government sector, was calling for change.
It advised its clients: ‘Cutting the need for rent collection out of the loop
is the single most important factor in tackling what can be a priority risk to
individuals and cash flow alike.
‘Wherever possible, tenants should be encouraged to pay by direct
debit. In those cases where tenants choose not to pay in this way,
the preferred arrangement will be for them to pay in person at a
designated cash office.’
And it wasn’t just the police and insurance companies that
threatened the future of rent collectors. The Audit Commission
was also in there pushing for change.
It was unhappy that both councils and housing associations were owed
large sums in rent arrears and while it wanted a different approach to
collection – drop the big stick and spend more time rewarding prompt
payment – it also wanted to see costs cut.
Weaver Vale was one of the housing associations that came in for
the Audit Commission treatment. In 2003/04, the trust was spending
£103,000 on cashiering charges to a local authority and £16,000 on
two rent collectors.
Two years later and the total cost of collecting rents had been reduced
to £30,000. Swipe cards have been introduced, bringing savings of
£89,000 a year. Of the two rent collectors, one was redeployed within the
trust and the other took early retirement.
It was the end of an era for tenants who had never known anything
other than the ‘rent man’ calling but the changes were taking place across
the sector and had been since the 1990s. Anchor Trust, for example, has
been at least eight years without rent collectors, gradually bringing in
direct debits and card systems for the tenants of its 24,000 homes.
Age Concern is in two minds about the change. Gillian Connor,
housing and communities policy adviser, says: ‘Seeing a familiar and
friendly face on a regular basis can make a big difference to many older
people who live alone.
‘Rent collectors, along with others whose jobs require home visits, are
often welcomed by isolated older residents who enjoy the social contact.
‘Sadly, that predictable pattern of personal contact can mean
older people become the target of bogus callers or opportunist thieves.
Rent collection encourages older people to keep cash at home, which
can be unsafe.
‘The demise of the rent collector as a regular visitor is regrettable,
but if older people were able to rely on neighbours, family, and other
trusted networks for support and neighbourliness, this would clearly be
better all round.’
The rent man – and woman – can still be found working in different
parts of the country, such as Chesterfield in Derbyshire, but in many areas
they are now a part of history. So should we have regrets?
The painter L S Lowry worked as a rent collector and got to know well
the poorer terraced streets of Manchester, their tenants providing him
with the characters for some of his most memorable works. He once
said: ‘I’ll always be grateful to rent collection. I’ve put many of the
tenants in my pictures.’
You wouldn’t get that with a Swipe card.
➔ Continued overleaf
1 July 2005 Inside Housing 23
As long as people
are calling for
the service then
I can’t see the
council deciding
to close it. The
vast majority of
the people who
receive a visit are
elderly and the
collector could be
the only person
they see all day
24 Inside Housing 1 July 2005
Still doing the rounds
Safety measures
Rent collectors may be extinct in other parts of the country, but a
handful of them are still going strong in one local authority.
The Derbyshire town of Chesterfield is adamant that as long as its
council tenants want a door-to-door rent collector, then that’s what
it will provide.
There are around 1,800 tenants who still plump for an officer
to collect their rent, down on the 8,000 households that were
visited 25 years ago but still a healthy percentage of the council’s
10,000 properties.
There were nine collectors when Steve Whittaker joined the housing
department 25 years ago, all of them working flat out each day. Now
there are just two full-time, one part-time and casual staff used as and
when needed.
‘There’s a generation that has influenced rent collection,’ says
Mr Whittaker. ‘It’s a generation that began to do things differently.
Virtually everyone today uses a bank account and bills get paid
differently. Women, who were once always at home, now go to work.
Why call when there’s no one there to collect the rent from?’
The gradual decline in the numbers wanting the council to call has
forced it to restructure the rounds a number of times over the years.
It had to have another one in March to look at how it could once again
condense the rounds.
‘But as long as people are calling for the service then I can’t see the
council deciding to close it,’ says Mr Whittaker. ‘The vast majority of the
people who receive a visit are elderly and the collector could be the only
person they see all day.’
That the tenants look forward to their fortnightly visit is obvious when
we go out on the rounds with Tracey Wood, who is nothing like your
archetypal rent collector.
For security reasons, we cannot show you a photograph of this 39year-old mum, but the cartoon character referred to at the opening of
this feature doesn’t have her long blonde hair and a beaming smile.
And the warmth of her personality comes immediately across as
she enters each of ‘her’ homes. ‘She’s wonderful,‘ says
85-year-old Lucy Hodson. ‘I can’t get out and when she visits
it’s wonderful to see her.’
It’s a sentiment echoed by neighbour Bernard Barnett,
71, who won’t use a direct debit system. ‘The service is
excellent and she’s a smashing person. I don’t hold
with direct debits so I prefer to pay my rent like this.
The council let’s us do it, we get a visit from Tracey
and everybody’s happy.’
‘They really do treasure Tracey and the other
rent collectors,’ says Mr Whittaker. ‘It’s not
just the ability to pay the rent in their own way,
but they can report repairs and have a chat.’
It’s a very rewarding job for Ms Wood,
who has been with Chesterfield Council
for the past seven years after two years
with neighbouring North Derbyshire
Council. She visits 450 homes every
fortnight and she knows each of
her tenants closely.
‘You get to know when
something’s wrong and
they’re not telling you,’
she says. ‘You’re always
there to listen and to
help – and they’ve got an
opinion on anything and
everything. I wouldn’t give
it up for the world.’
Stories of violence against rent collectors have been with us down
the ages.
The tales of Robin Hood tell how he and his merry men would
lighten the load of the Sheriff of Nottingham’s rent collectors and
spread it among the poor.
And the not-so-merry men of the Kray gang used to take the
burden from the rent collectors working for the notorious landlord
Peter Rachman in post-war London.
The story has it that the Kray gang demanded protection
money to ‘guard’ his rent collectors but the first cheque under the
agreement bounced and the Kray enforcers moved in. As Reggie
Kray is reported to have said: ‘His rent collectors were big, but our
boys were bigger.’
With the post-war demolition of the nation’s slums and the
development of more and more council estates, there seemed to
be a job for life for the council rent collector.
But by the end of the 1990s their days were numbered with the
ever-growing use of modern technology payment systems and an
increase of violence towards them.
Doncaster Council is among those that have called time on
door-to-door rent collection. At the time, Gary Allen, head of housing,
told the town’s tenants and residents association: ‘Unfortunately,
a number of incidents occurred in 2001 which threatened the safety
of our rent collectors.
‘I know how much many of our tenants appreciated a rent
collector calling. However, the safety of this group of staff was
of a primary concern and as a result changes in this service had
to be made.’
Zurich Municipal, the public sector insurance company, was
already warning that rent collectors should be phased out to protect
both the individuals and the takings.
But it said there were going to be circumstances for which the use
of rent collectors was unavoidable. It made a list of recommendations
that called for rent collection staff to receive full training, including
how to avoid placing themselves in danger and hand over any cash
without question in the face of an attack.
Zurich also called for collectors to be issued with personal attack
alarms or mobile phones with a one number dial to reach emergency
services. Cash should be carried in special bags holding smoke dye
and cash spoiling devices.
Whenever possible, routes and times of collections should be
varied to avoid fixed routines. Routes needed to avoid isolated or
poorly illuminated areas and collectors rotated to different rounds.
When cash carrying exceeded £2,500, the collectors should be
met en route by a security vehicle or payment into a bank or office
during the round.
Regrettably, these instructions came out too late to save the
life of Doreen Taylor, a 54-year-old rent collector with Rotherham
Council who went missing one June morning in 1992 only to be
found later in an outbuilding of a house she had visited on her usual
collection round.
Her leather money satchel was missing and when a 21-year-old
man was sentenced to life for her murder, it was established that the
motive for attacking Mrs Taylor had been robbery.
The tragedy shook the whole town, especially her colleagues at the
council, which was already investigating an attack on another rent
collector previous to Mrs Taylor being found murdered.
The incident triggered a call by the then town hall union NALGO
for rent collectors in the town to be issued with walkie-talkies, which
they were. The Health & Safety Executive served an enforcement
notice on the council telling it to tighten up its safety procedures after
attacks on staff in other departments, as well as housing.
’Lady’s work’ – rent collecting and Victorian philanthropy
Ruth Livesey tells the story of late-19th century social housing pioneers
Beatrice Webb and Octavia Hill
In May 1888, Beatrice Webb envisaged the east end of London with a
new-found sense of detachment and containment.
Working as a rent collector at Katherine Buildings in Whitechapel, a
few years earlier, Webb had been alternately attracted and repelled by
her part in what she termed the ‘certain weird romance’ of philanthropy
‘with neither beginning nor end’.
By the time she entered that in her diary, she had achieved some
success with her early publications on social questions and was coming to
distinguish herself as a social investigator from the lady philanthropists at
work in the east end during this period.
Katherine Buildings, opened in east Smithfield in 1885, was one
of the first ventures of the East End Dwellings Company which, along
with Guinness and Peabody, was attempting to reshape the innerLondon districts.
Whilst Webb’s former co-workers at Katherine Buildings freely
expressed various forms of dissent from the philosophies of Octavia
Hill, the founder of philanthropic rent collecting schemes, all were in
agreement with Hill’s basic tenet that the success of such schemes was in
detailed work with individual families.
It was Hill’s insistence that the work was detailed and relied on
‘personal influence’ and regular household visits that demarcated rentcollecting and philanthropic housing management as ‘lady’s work’ from
the 1870s onwards.
Her rhetoric of place, belonging and community rewrote the London
slums as an environment in which the presence of the educated lady on
the streets was natural and necessary.
Hill’s first venture into rent collecting in Marylebone in 1864
was sponsored by her friend John Ruskin, to whom she promised a
five per cent annual profit in addition to the altruistic benefit of seeing
an improvement in the appearance and moral tone of the alley and
its inhabitants.
By 1874, Hill and the host of lady volunteers trained by her were
responsible for 15 different housing schemes throughout London, mostly
old, run-down streets and courts, but with a few newer properties dotted
throughout the capital. Hill’s philanthropic scheme was a simple one on
the face of it: the perfunctory efforts of the landlord’s ‘ordinary clerk’ were
to be replaced by the regular attentions of a ‘sympathetic … lady’ volunteer.
The weekly round of rent collection was to be transformed into
an altruistic gesture and the waged working-class male collector
displaced by a handful of ladies, interested only in the tenants and
not in personal remuneration.
Hill figured such property management as a proper feminine
duty, representing it as an extended version of middle-class women’s
domestic responsibilities.
Like so many middle-class women social activists of the period,
Hill’s rhetoric of maternalism demarcated a specific female realm of
citizenship, as is evident in her argument that ‘ladies’ must do rent
collecting ‘for it is household work’.
In demonstrating the ethical benefits of her scheme to her donors,
Hill’s writings in the 1870s and 1880s represent her as an authoritative
mother, disciplining the characters of her unruly infantilised tenants.
Hill believed that it was only once slum tenants had learned to ‘love’
their lady rent collector and feel shame at the prospect of disappointing
her with unkempt interiors and drunkenness that there was any point in
improving the accommodation itself.
Whitewash and new window panes were the reward for stirring signs
of character growth: only then, when character had been reinscribed
through the new maternal example, would such work have any lasting
effect, otherwise the buildings would sink back into disrepair reflecting
the inadequate characters of those within.
Small wonder, then, that Beatrice Webb felt ‘rather depressed by the
bigness’ of the work when she took up rent collecting in Whitechapel
in 1885. ‘When I look at those long balconies and think of all the queer
characters – occupants and would-be occupants and realise that the
characters of the community will depend on our personal power’, she
confessed, ‘I feel rather dizzy.’
● Dr Livesey is lecturer in 19th century literature and deputy director
of the Centre for Victorian Studies at Royal Holloway, University of
London. This is an edited extract from Women Rent Collectors and
the Rewriting of Space, Class and Gender in East London 1870-1900,
which will appear in Women and the Making of Built Space in England,
1870-1950 edited by Elizabeth Darling and Lesley Whitworth, to be
published by Ashgate later this year
Hill believed that
it was only once
slum tenants
had learned to
‘love’ their lady
rent collector
and feel shame
at the prospect
of disappointing
her with
unkempt
interiors and
drunkenness
that there was
any point in
improving the
accommodation
itself
1 July 2005 Inside Housing 25