An Urgent Reminder, Register Your Deposit NOW!

If you are a landlord and you received a tenancy deposit before 7th April 2007 and the tenancy became a periodic tenancy after 7th April 2007, then you must register that deposit by 23rd June 2015.

It may be that a fixed-term tenancy was entered into before 7th April 2007 but the tenant has remained in situ without a new fixed term tenancy being entered into. The Deregulation Act 2015 provides a short-term indemnity for those landlords who have not registered in these particular circumstances but this ends on 23rd June. It is essential that tenants also receive, and acknowledge receipt of, the “Prescribed Information” about the tenant deposit scheme when the deposit is registered.
 
If a landlord does not register it, or serve the Prescribed Information, then the landlord will not only have problems serving a valid Notice requiring Possession under Section 21 of the Housing Act 1988 (and in practice will have to return the deposit before serving a Section 21 Notice), but will also be liable to a claim by the tenant for the landlord’s failure to register the deposit; resulting in having to pay the tenant up to three times the deposit and the tenant’s legal costs of such a claim.
 
All deposits paid after 7th April 2015 need to be registered and the Prescribed Information served. Where deposits were received before 7th April 2007 and there have been a succession of continuous fixed-term tenancies, the landlord will not face a penalty for not registering the deposit (in effect before the legislation was introduced in 2007) but will still have to register the deposit before serving the Section 21 Notice.

Once a deposit has been registered – so long as the landlord, tenant, property and tenant protection scheme remain the same – the deposit does not have to be reregistered when a new tenancy is entered into.
 
Should you have any queries on this matter then please contact Jeremy Teall or Aisha Akhtar, at Prince Evans Solicitors LLP, on 020 8567 3477