North Okanagan motel owner fined $20,000 after tenant dispute

A North Okanagan motel owner has to pay $20,000 in fines after locking out a long-term homeless tenant last year.

The owners of the Ramshorn Motel in Lumby changed the tenant’s lock while she was away for a week. Despite multiple rulings in her favour, the landlord barred her from accessing her room for months as they rented it to nightly guests again.

A recently published Residential Tenancy Branch decision ended with a $20,000 penalty against the motel owners, finding they demonstrated “serious disregard” for the law and their obligations as a landlord.

“Their actions not only violated the tenant’s rights but also undermined the process designed to protect those rights,” tenancy branch enforcement case manager Christy Sorley said in her decision.

Residential tenancy branch investigators caught wind of the case through media reports documenting Megan Wood’s repeated efforts to deal with the owners of the Ramshorn Motel.

She moved in after she was connected through a shelter operator in February 2024, which was paying the rent on her behalf through a provincial assistance program, according to the decision. By May, the owners posted a notice to her door that stated she must move out by June.

It claimed she hadn’t paid rent for two months, but Wood continued to live there until August and rent was paid through that time, according to the decision.

While Wood was away for a week in late-August, the landlords contracted a pest control company after receiving of a bed bug infestation from others, which they narrowed down to Wood’s unit. They changed the lock in that time.

According to the decision, there was no evidence the bed bugs came from Wood’s room.

She stayed in her car, at a motel and a campground over the next three months without most of her belongings. Wood won access to her unit in an October Residential Tenancy Branch hearing, then received an order from BC Supreme Court to enforce it a week later.

Meanwhile, the landlords reopened the unit to nightly guests. Wood didn’t get access to the room again and didn’t get access to her belongings until after December 2024 BC Supreme Court decision found the landlords in contempt.

Landlords Hardial Singh Chahal and Jasbinder Singh Purewal own 33 properties throughout BC, including four motels in the Vernon and Lumby areas, according to the decision.

They have 60 days to pay the fine if they do not appeal the order.