Working or running a business from home

Are you thinking of running a business from your home or even just working from home? If so, we’ve put together some useful tips which should help answer any questions you may have.

Can I work from home?

If you’d like to work or run a business from your home, you’ll need to put a request in to us in writing first. You can either post a letter to Southern Housing Group, Spire Court, Albion Way, Horsham, West Sussex RH12 1JW or you can e-mail us at service.centre@shgroup.org.uk. We’ll take a look at your request and then get in touch to let you know if everything is ok.

It’s important that your work or business don’t break any planning laws and there’s no damage caused to your home.  It’s also important that you don’t cause any nuisance or annoyance to others in the neighbourhood.

We’ll always try to help you when if you’re thinking of working or running a business from home, so we’ve put together some handy examples which can be used as a guide:

We will usually give permission if:

• You want to use part of your home as an office
• You are a sales rep working from home
• You want to install an additional phone line for your business
• You want to advertise your phone numbers in trade publications
• You are a registered child minder (providing you have the consent of your social services department)

We will not agree to you:

• Advertising on the outside of the property
• Trade advertising using your home address
• Parking large commercial vehicles at the property/scheme
• Storing trade material
• Carrying out car or other vehicle repairs

Can we withdraw permission?

If your business became a nuisance or led to complaints, we’d ask you to try to prevent the nuisance or we may even ask that you stop working from home altogether, due to you breaking the terms and conditions of your tenancy agreement or lease.