Our team deals with noise complaints related to homes and businesses.
We can’t deal with noise made in public places, such as the street. Public noise complaints are dealt with by the police – call 101 if you need to make a complaint about public noise.
Dealing with noise in Portsmouth
In a busy city like Portsmouth, environmental noise is ever-present. This means we can’t ensure peace and quiet or prevent occasional disturbance from noise.
We work with the anti-social behaviour unit and the police to prevent or deal with serious or persistently unacceptable levels of environmental noise, by investigating and resolving complaints of noise nuisance.
The seven most common causes of noise complaint are:
- Noise from domestic properties
- Amplified music from pubs and clubs
- Animal noise
- Commercial noise, such as from deliveries and equipment
- Construction and demolition site noise
- Industrial noise
- Alarms from premises and vehicles
Around 2,500 noise complaints are received each year, with the majority coming from residents who are suffering noise problems from their neighbours.
Night noise
Noise problems often occur outside of normal working hours, so our night noise service will investigate recurring evening and night-time nuisance during the following hours:
- Monday to Saturday – 6pm to 2am
- Sunday – 6.30 pm to 1.30am
When you contact us we will explain our powers and procedures and provide details of how to contact the duty night noise officer. Due to demand we will only be able to investigate night noise following registration and activation of your complaint.
Further information
For some types of problem, particularly domestic noise, trying to negotiate an improvement with the person causing the noise is often recommended – the Portsmouth mediation service can help with this.
You can find further information about: