What to do if noisy neighbors do not let you live?

Many people remember the Soviet cartoon "The Story of a Crime", which tells about a city dweller who could not relax at home after a hard day because of noisy neighbors. As a result, Vasily Vasilyevich almost killed the janitor who was screaming in the morning. Unfortunately, the issue of silence as a necessary component of comfortable housing, raised back in 1962 by the director and animator Fyodor Khitruk, has not lost its relevance.

There is no greater problem than bad neighbors.

In addition to construction shortcomings due to negligent workers or developers who do not comply with SNiPs, conflicts with noisy neighbors are, unfortunately, not uncommon in high-rise buildings. It is not so easy to calm down the citizens, because of which you have lost your peace and sleep. The task is also complicated by the materials from which partitions and ceilings are erected in modern houses, turning such a dwelling into a sound-amplifying resonator.

Those who do not want to put up with constant noise prefer to hire specialists in soundproofing apartments. However, as practice shows, this is a very, very half-hearted solution. Cheap soundproofing options practically do not change the overall picture. More or less effective soundproofing will cost a lot of zeros, and most importantly, a tangible loss of apartment space due to the inevitable thickening of walls and ceilings. Those who are not ready for such sacrifices are forced to either come to terms with reality or enter into protracted “wars for silence” with their neighbors, the outcome of which is unpredictable.

Be friends with your neighbor, but hold on to your sword

There are several communities in Runet that unite people who suffer from noisy neighbors. For example, the site "Club Defenders of Silence", which brought together people united by a similar problem. There you can find various stories of such wars, resolved, including by relatively peaceful means.

“At first I politely asked the neighbor not to make noise, but it didn’t help. Then I completely turned off his radio and rented a one-room apartment 200 meters from my apartment. Then he hired two workers who from 16:00 to 23:00 gouged the floor all over my apartment with a perforator and a jackhammer (noisy neighbors from below) ... In general, we agreed, and we have been living in peace for half a year - we even began to say hello, ” With announced one of the winners of such a confrontation I.

Someone manages to reach an agreement with the help of a simple dialogue, but most Internet users consider it the most effective way to “hit in the snout”.

If you have a rank in boxing or you have the physical parameters of Valuev, then it may not be a problem to succeed in confronting a noisy neighbor. Examples of this do exist. Those who failed to reason with the troublemaker with words "calmed down the noisy neighbors in the stairwell with a baseball bat."

As follows from the “bad advice” of Internet users, other illegal methods also turn out to be effective: twisting plugs in a shield, epoxy glue in a keyhole, breaking windows, exposure to phone calls or directed music, and other administrative hooliganism.

Russian citizens do not choose such a cardinal approach because of ignorance of the Administrative or Criminal Codes of the Russian Federation. On the contrary, everyone knows “what is good and what is bad”, but in the legislative field it is very difficult to resist noisy neighbors in Russia.

We, for our part, in no case advise following such "recommendations", since the consequences of this can be very sad for the "fighters for silence" themselves. There are also legitimate methods of solving the problem, although they are inferior to the baseball bat in terms of efficiency and speed of resolving the issue.

Lots of laws, little sense

The fact is that the peace and quiet of citizens is regulated by several documents at once. These are 52-FZ "On the sanitary and epidemiological well-being of the population" and the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation (CAO) with regional amendments to the law on silence.

According to Art. 3.13 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of Moscow, for actions that violate the peace and quiet of citizens from 23:00 to 7:00, a warning or a fine may be issued: for an individual in the amount of one thousand to 2 thousand rubles, for an official - from 4 thousand to 8 thousand rubles , legal - from 40 thousand to 80 thousand rubles.

According to the law in force in the capital "On maintaining the peace of citizens and silence at night", cases of violation of silence are:

• Production of repair, construction and loading and unloading works
• Playing musical instruments
• Use of TVs, radios, tape recorders
• Using car alarm horns
• Shouting, whistling, singing
• Use of pyrotechnics

Exceptions include actions “committed during the performance of religious cults within the framework of the canonical requirements of the respective confessions, as well as during the holding of cultural events on the initiative of the authorities.” An exception is also made for actions “aimed at preventing offenses, eliminating the consequences of accidents, natural disasters, and other emergencies.” This was reported on the website of the Prosecutor's Office of the city of Moscow.

In a word, you can pray noisily or call for help, but stomping loudly or watching TV at full volume is not.

In the Moscow region and most other regions of the Russian Federation, "silent" night time is legally established - from 22:00 to 6:00 on weekdays and from 23:00 to 9:00 on weekends. In addition, there is a quiet hour every day from 13:00 to 15:00, when noisy repairs, even permitted by law, from 9:00 to 19:00, cannot be carried out.

For citizens, the amount of penalties for violations of the law on silence is determined in the amount of 500 rubles to 4 thousand. In case of refusal to pay a fine, noisy neighbors can be sent to a temporary detention center for 15 days.

But there is no one in Russia to control compliance with all these requirements.

The police are called upon to keep order, they are not interested in riots

The police ceased to execute the regional Code of Administrative Offenses after the reform of 2011, becoming an exclusively federal structure, whose funding is provided only from the federal budget. In July 2014, the State Duma adopted an amendment to the Code of Administrative Offenses, which allowed the Ministry of Internal Affairs to monitor compliance with regional codes in the presence of an agreement with the authorities of the territories, and police trips should be separately funded from local budgets. However, so far the Ministry of Internal Affairs does not have such agreements with any of the regions, and due to changes in legislation, the police cannot issue rulings on violations of local administrative codes.

Accordingly, the whole issue rests on money, which Russia does not have much due to the crisis. The deficit of regional budgets is forcing local authorities to take out loans for current expenses, so they are not yet up to such trifles as fining noisy residents.

As a result, law enforcement officers often, referring to the fact that the police do not have the opportunity to fine noisy neighbors, completely refuse to respond to the corresponding calls from citizens. What is surprising, because no one forbade people in uniform to stop violations.

Not long shafts, but reaches Moscow

In Moscow, within the framework of an agreement between the capital's mayor's office and the local commander-in-chief of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, it was decided to transfer part of the administrative offenses to the control and supervision services, and leave part to the police.

The press service of Petrovka 38 told Reedus that administrative commissions in district prefectures are now dealing with noisy neighbors in the capital. The district police officers, who are obliged to respond to such appeals from citizens, "carry out a set of measures and submit to these commissions a package of documents for each violator of silence."

In turn, the prefectures of Moscow said that their divisions of the administrative commissions do not deal with violations of the law on silence and advised them to contact the employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. At this point, the circle is closed.

© Maxim Blinov/RIA Novosti

The Association of Administrative and Technical Inspections of Moscow confirmed to us that the administrative commissions deal only with violations of the noise level by legal entities.

“If noisy work is carried out at the construction site at night, this is for us. If a cafe or a shop in your house is noisy at night - this is for us, but if the neighbors are noisy - this is a matter exclusively for the police, - commented in the press service of the association. - In general, the issue of noisy neighbors is very difficult. It seems like no one cares about them at all. The only thing we can advise is to negotiate with such a neighbor personally.”

In turn, a Reedus source in the administrative commission of the council of one of the Moscow districts noted that the commission had previously considered the issue of noisy neighbors, but now disturbers of the peace - individuals "are of no interest to anyone."

Policemen leave on calls, but legal responsibility for offenders does not come. The fact is that the outfits that arrived on a call, according to the commission worker, almost never draw up protocols.

“They come, conduct a survey of neighbors and send replies to the commissions: questionnaires, some acts, reports, etc., but without the main document - the protocol - no administrative case can be opened. In the best case, the district police officer can conduct an educational conversation with the disturber, but this most often does not happen. At the same time, the police assure that they have fully fulfilled their obligations to citizens,” noted the source.

The police of the Moscow region went even further. Here, Reedus was informed that complaints about the noise of neighbors are received regularly, but most often their initiators are "unfriendly citizens" who use such complaints "as a weapon." So, according to an employee of law enforcement agencies near Moscow, up to 80% of calls to "noisy neighbors" come from "older female representatives with a nasty character."

“I remember a case when during the year we regularly came to the same address in the city of Elektrostal. There, two elderly lonely neighbors on the landing complained about each other, accusing them of breaking the silence. At the same time, none of the other neighbors heard the noise at all. Later, these same two old women repeatedly tried to summon an outfit to one of the city garden associations. It turned out that there, too, elderly ladies lived in neighboring areas. Such a “war” lasted until the death of one of the opponents, police officer said.

© Maxim Blinov/RIA Novosti

They cut a window to Europe, but forgot the door (Sergey Fedin, writer)

By the way, the problem of noisy neighbors is not limited to Russia. For example, in Europe, calls to the police about violations of public order by neighbors (up to the noise from the washing machine at night) are a common occurrence. At the same time, with the influx of migrants unfamiliar with European standards, the number of noisy neighbors in the EU countries has increased significantly.

True, the European police strictly monitor compliance with the law in this area, and troublemakers in the EU are hit hard on the wallet.

In France, for example, the amount of fines ranges from several tens to several hundred euros.

In Spain, for the most severe violations, the fine reaches up to $300.

In the UK, special noise control units can issue a fine of $ 7-8 thousand.

In Germany, the population is particularly sensitive to noise at night. They require, for example, not to take a shower, not to throw garbage into the garbage chute and not to grind coffee after 22:00. For such actions, a fine of up to 10 thousand euros can be awarded.

In Russia, despite the imperfection of the legislative, executive and judicial systems, it is possible to achieve success in the struggle for peace and quiet without transgressing the law, lawyers interviewed by Reedus assure. Although this happens very rarely. The Legal Support Center offered us the following step-by-step instructions for dealing with noisy neighbors:

1 STEP. We agree

A bad peace is better than a good quarrel.

First you need to try to negotiate peace by talking with a neighbor about the fact that he causes certain inconveniences, and tactfully ask him to be quieter. Many simply do not think that their actions can interfere with someone.

Often the reason for the noise is festive events associated with the arrival of guests. In this case, you just need to discuss the duration of the holiday with your neighbors. By the way, once a year, night noise is also permissible under the law - from December 31 to January 1, from 22:00 to 4:00. If the cause of the noise is renovation, then the most convenient schedule for the work can be discussed.

True, as practice shows, understanding can be achieved extremely rarely.

2 STEP. Looking for other dissatisfied

Where there are two, there is not one.

Noisy neighbors cause problems for other residents as well. Therefore, it is worth acting together: write a collective application to the HOA or the management company (MC). A collective complaint with the support of the Criminal Code may even lead to the eviction of noisy citizens living under a social lease agreement.

If noisy neighbors rent housing from individuals, complain to the owner of the apartment. Usually in such cases, the owners offer troubled tenants to move out. If the apartment is rented illegally, then you can contact the FMS.

You should also jointly contact Rospotrebnadzor, namely the SES. SES can measure the noise level on the spot, and, if it is above the permissible limits, draw up an appropriate act.

3 STEP. We call the police

The police are a cosmic constant(Stanislav Lem, writer).

If negotiations with neighbors are at an impasse, and the noise continues, then call the police. Report the fact of the offense and inform about the intention to write a statement. Here one should count only on the effect produced on the neighbors by the very visit of the policemen. Other legal consequences from calling the police, as noted above, should not be expected.

A police squad may arrive in two or three hours, so it is worth collecting evidence - audio or video recordings. It is also best to call the police at the beginning of a neighborhood party. Usually a few calls are enough to calm the offenders.

4 STEP. We contact the prosecutor's office

The prosecutor's office in modern Russia is a body of preliminary intimidation(Andrey Cherkizov, journalist)

In every third case of the refusal of the police to come (they may report that there are no free outfits), you should clarify the registration number of your appeal and contact the prosecutor's office. The prosecutor's office must conduct an audit and report its results in writing.

5 STEP. I'm going to court

It's easier to pay off than to sue.

The most drastic measure is litigation. To file a claim, it is necessary to collect all the evidence - copies of complaints (including collective ones) to the HOA (ZHSK, UK), duplicate protocols (if any) on calling the police, testimonies of other residents, relevant video recordings and the decibel level recorded by the SES.

Typically, such cases are considered for at least six months. With a successful court decision, a noisy citizen will be sentenced to the maximum fine, and tenants renting an apartment may be required to move out. The owners cannot be evicted from the apartment, but litigation can be a headache for them.

At the same time, lawyers strongly advise against resorting to effective, but illegal from the point of view of Russian legislation, methods of fighting for silence.

“Of course, a baseball bat misused can help reason with some brawler neighbor, but believe me, in an unfortunate set of circumstances, much more noisy neighbors in a prison cell will be waiting for you,” the lawyer explained to Reedus.