So we had a judgment in our favour dated 13 Feb 2012, this was for £714.2 (£675 debt and £39.2 interest up to judgment date) and £175 costs. We have since paid for a bailiff but this was unsuccessful. We are now applying for a charging order against his property, how do we calculate the interest? I know it's 8% p.a. or 0.022 per day but is the interest on: (a) The original £675 (675 x days since judgment x daily interest then add the original £39.2 back in) (b) The total amount in the judgment £889.2 * daily interest rate * days since judgment © The same as (b) but can we include the costs we paid to the bailiffs? Many thanks

Last week thurs (17th Jan 2013), a bunch of Bailiff guys came into the flat that I am staying in to clear things out of the flat as they have court orders that the landlord had actually sold the place 2 years ago and she does not have the rights to rent it out due to this. My flatmates had called the police and when the police had arrived and had confirmed about this as well (as the Bailiff have court letters to show the policeman). Due to this, I have contacted the landlord that I've paid to and she had promised to return the 6 weeks deposit (a total of £1275) that I've paid to on 21st Jan 2013. I have waited till that day itself and had text her many times. At the end of the day till now I have only received a back a total of £220. I have texted her and to inform her that I am giving her till 26th Jan 2013 to get back my deposit or else I will be heading to the county court which the court will ask for one to three times the deposit due to the reason that she did not register my deposit under the government's deposit scheme. I had seek advices from Shelter and the Citizen Advice Bureau and I am preparing the N208 claim form. My problem is that, the adviser from Shelter had said that I will need to have the current address of the Landlord else I will not be able to enforce the claim. I am not sure what should I do now as the landlord just said you can go to the court if you want and I can't find her current address at all (had tried 192.com, seaching online, yellow pages, etc). Really need some help as I can't move into a new place too without my deposit.

My father let out his house through an agency to what has turned out to be the tenant from hell. After 12 months of non payment of rent (the agent did nothing unless pushed by us) we have finally managed to get the house back but had to change the locks. A cleaning firm has been in and cleaned the place at a cost of £300. The carpets are ruined the front door will need replaced die to , it looks like, it having been kicked in or forcibly entered at some point. There was evidence of crack cocaine and general drug use found by the cleaner and us. A prepayment meter was added by British Gas as the tenant ran up arrears of £1000+. Question - how easy is it to get the meter removed Question - do we have any recourse with the agent ie can we sue him? He operates undet the banner of a local estate agent but after some digging it seems he is nothing to do with them although the Estate Agents website clearly states "For lettings and property rentals please contact our associated company and advisors "xxxxxxxxx" on xxxxxxxx. xxxxxxxxxxLettings are a premier lettings agent and property rental agent in xxxxxxxx. Despite being a separate company, they conveniently operate from the same building as ourselves " They say they are a separate company but also say they are their associated company Can anyone help us please? tx

Hello! This is my first thread so look forward to reading the responses. I wish to file a claim (c£3,000) against my previous landlady. She agreed to pay costs we directly bore (moving, hotel, storage, etc) because the house was not in move-in condition at the start of our lease. She then reneged after we bore these costs and moved in. We withheld rent which she in turn withheld from our deposit when we moved out, and we have been unable to reach an agreement since. The landlady is Brazilian and resides in, and is domiciled in, Brazil. I know I need to file an N510 form but am unsure how to complete it. I need to tick a box on the form to explain the basis for why the claim form can be served out of jurisdiction without the permission of the court. Can someone please advise? My best guess is either 6.33(1)(b)(ii) or 6.33(2)(b)(ii) but I can't tell why I would prefer one over the other, or if either is correct! The form reads as follows: Please tick one of the following boxes as your statement of why the claim form can be served out of the jurisdiction without the permission of the court. Also delete anything in square brackets that does not apply. In proceedings to which rule 6.32(1)(b)(i) or 6.33(2)(b)(i) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the [Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982] [Judgments Regulation (as defined in CPR rule 6.31(d))] to hear this claim, that the defendant is domiciled in [the United Kingdom] [a Member State] and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or any other Member State.” In proceedings to which rule 6.32(1)(b)(ii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982, the claim being one to which paragraph 11 of Schedule 4 to that Act applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom.” In proceedings to which rule 6.32(1)(b)(iii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982, the defendant being a party to an agreement conferring jurisdiction to which paragraph 12 of Schedule 4 to that Act applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom.” In proceedings to which rule 6.32(2) or 6.33(3) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has the power to hear this claim under [state the provisions of the relevant enactment or Community instrument] which satisfies the requirements of [CPR rule 6.32(2)] [CPR rule 6.33(3)] and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom, in any other Convention territory of any Contracting State (as defined in section 1(3) of the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982) or in any other Member State.” In proceedings to which rule 6.33(1)(b)(ii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982, the claim being one to which article 16 of Schedule 1 or article 16 of Schedule 3C to that Act applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or any other Convention territory of any Contracting State (as defined in section 1(3) of that Act).” In proceedings to which rule 6.33(1)(b)(iii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982, the defendant being a party to an agreement conferring jurisdiction to which article 17 of Schedule 1 or article 17 of Schedule 3C to that Act applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or in any other Convention territory of any Contracting State (as defined in section 1(3) of that Act).” In proceedings to which rule 6.33(2)(b)(ii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Judgments Regulation (as defined in CPR rule 6.31(d)), the claim being one to which article 22 of that Regulation applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or any other Member State.” In proceedings to which rule 6.33(2)(b)(iii) applies, the statement is — “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales] [ County Court] has power under the Judgments Regulation (as defined in CPR rule 6.31(d)), the defendant being a party to an agreement conferring jurisdiction to which article 23 of that Regulation applies, to hear this claim and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or any other Member State.” In proceedings to which rule 6.33(1)(b)(i) applies, the statement is— “I state that the [High Court of England and Wales][ County Court] has power under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982 to hear this claim, that the defendant is domiciled in [the United Kingdom] [a Convention territory of a Contracting State (as defined in section 1(3) of the Act)] and that no proceedings are pending between the parties in the courts of any other part of the United Kingdom or any other Convention territory of any Contracting State. Many thanks!

Hi all, We've been living in the same rented house for 5 years now. We are never late with the rent, and have never missed a payment. We now have to sign a new contract, and for the priveledge of signing, we have to pay the landlord £50. The rent is high enough as it is. Is this standard procedure? Can they do that? Thanks in advance.

Hi all, i have an issue with my deposit on the property i am currently renting, ill start at the beginning. We rented the property on the 25th of may, we payed the deposit and first months rent to a letting agent, we were then informed that the LL would be managing the property. A few months passed and in the December we were notified that the house was being repossessed and would be auctioned. The house was sold and we got a new tenancy with a new LL. I am currently chasing the original LL for the deposit of £625, we received no proof of the deposit being payed into a scheme and we have been told by the original letting agent that they passed the deposit over to the original LL but again we have no proof of this. I am urgently seeking some advice as to what steps to take in claiming the deposit back from the original LL and where i would stand legally as he is proofing to be extremely uncooperative. any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Hello I have a flat at Hounslow, London. I had a tenant from August 2011. the tenant paid a deposit which was kept by the agent. I and my tenant both have receipts from the estate agent. the agreement with the tenant finished in August 2012. He vacated the property. After repeated emails both from me and the ex- tenant, the estate agent is not returning the money. I also owe some amount towards the cleaning of the property (the tenant agreed to this) The agent also does not respond to phone calls. When the tenant went and met the agent in person he was assured that the money will be returned. But there was no transaction even after months. I managed to talk to the agent after repeated calls from a new number. the agent admitted that the money is in a trust and they will return it. But even after months there is no response. Meanwhile the ex tenant is preparing to go to court and it seems I will be pulled to court for no offence of mine. Please could you advise me as to how to get the money back from the agent

I recently moved to Norwich to have some peace and quiet after a stressful job. Finding an affordable house to rent in the right area was difficult a the market is very competitive here. I found a perfect terraced house in my favourite area, applied and was successful. I noticed a notice in the kitchen window of my neighbour saying "loud, deaf musician lives here". As peace and quiet is my primary concern I asked the estate agent to contact the landlord about it before I paid my deposit. The message came back from the landlord to the estate agent that the notice had been there for years, it was just a joke and the landlord had never heard of any problems with the neighbour. The neighbour actually IS a loud, deaf musician, who tutors rock groups at home several evenings a week, plays his own music late into the night (3am) on occasion and practices the drums regularly. I have tried to come to some sort of amicable agreement with him but he has been abusive and uncooperative. He said that every tenant before me had a problem with the noise but none of them had managed to get him to change. The neighbour is not only noisy but I know him to be violent, take drugs and drink to excess. I cannot withstand the stress of living here but I am unsure what my rights are. Even if the landlord didn't know about the noise, surely he should have checked out the problem rather than just told me that there was no problem? My landlord took 6 months upfront rent (because I am self-employed) and I paid substantial fees to the estate agent (who I believe did not do due diligence). Can I get this all back?

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the correct thread but, Can anyone tell me what are the requirements are for removing the Letting agency from the agreement and just doing the letting privately. Would it depend on the agreement which was initially signed, or is there a time schedule by law which is prevalent to these things? We've had a tenant for 3 years now and a 'management' company swiping 10% per month to look cheerful!!! Can we just terminate the agreement and keep the tenant with a new private agreement or are there complications in law? If anyone has experience of this please can you update me? Thanks in advance.

We have been leasing this property since beginning of oct.. so nearly 12 weeks.. since then we have needed our hot water tanks and dishwasher replaced.. which was done in about 2/3 weeks... we also have the front screen door that is broken.. and we have been asking to get this fixed since the start.. i was told that i needed to urgently send in the user manuals in.. as it is a just before christmas and i have a 4 month old im very busy so i told them i would drop off at my own convince or if it was that urgent she could come pick up.. because of my response i got hit with an inspection the last monday.. my door still isnt fixed.. and i get an email today telling me someone would be round to fix today.. no time?? also in the email is the landlord asking us to not park on the front grass.. and to weed the gardens.. The garden had weeds in it before we moved in!! i dont have time to fix up there garden... what are my wrights??? can we park on the grass in our yard that we rent?? i am more than happy to keep the property yard at the standard it was when we moved in... The landlord seems to be just being just being a pain in my ass because i asked for a few repairs to the property so it would be suitable to live in.. we are not the tenants from hell... quiet the opposite... just want to live in peace!! Please any Advice would be good..

Hi everyone, my brother and his wife have got a situation with their landlord, they have a 30 day rolling contract (I can confirm this if any one needs the specifics) the story thus far is below: On 3rd Nov, they gave notice and informed the landlord/letting agents that they were vacating the premises on 3rd Dec 2012. On 10th Nov the property they were moving to was removed as the landlord decided to pull it off the rental market and sell it. On 11th November they informed the letting agent they had been let down and were not moving after, they told the letting agent they were going to be staying for the 'foreseeable future'. On the 11th November the landlord responded with a request for clarification of 'foreseeable future' and specifically whether this would mean the continuance of their tenancy past Christmas 2012. My brother and his wife responded with they were looking at a couple of other place and if the places where not suitable they would then stay beyond Christmas and possibly beyond. On 21st November they informed the letting agency/landlord they were moving on the 3rd after all. On the 22nd November, the landlord informed the letting agent that he was unhappy and was seeking another months rent with this statement - 'This leaves us with at the very least one months loss of rental earnings through no fault of our own which is unreasonable. ' 23rd they landlord then retracted the demand and made a new demands for 2 weeks rent - and therefore we can offer a compromise of two weeks additional rent to be paid by X which results in two weeks loss of rental by ourselves. The landlord then added this - As we have already signed and exchanged a new agency agreement with XXX we will contact them to determine if they have incurred any costs to date for advertising, preparing new Tenancy papers etc and advise you accordingly. They had advertised the property for let from the 3rd-11th Nov and apparently had a couple of viewings but no firm offers. The adverts were pulled on the 11-12th and resumed on the 22-23rd. So, the questions... What the heck do we do about this? Is he liable for the additional rent demand? Is he liable for the losses of the letting agent? - I do not believe the landlord not the agent has actually suffered any real world tangible loss... If he refuses to pay I assume the landlord will dispute the return of the deposit, how does he go about defending this claim? Should he defend it? That will do for now, I look forward to a few thoughts from Caggers on the forum... mrbrooks

Hi guys, How are you all today? I have an issue with my ex landlord. Myself and my partner were in a 6 month lease at our last address which passed with no real issues. We then went onto a rolling monthly contract. The landlord after 6 months decided to increase the rent by 5% and said that he will be doing this every 6 months. The property didn't have saftey catches on the downstairs windows so they could just swing wide open and we have 2 kids aged 4 and 2 and found this to be dangerous. Because of these reasons we have had to look elsewhere for a property. We found a house that had cheaper rent with double glazed windows with saftey catches and no 6 monthly rent increases + it had front and back gardens for our kids. Needless to say we jumped at the chance of taking this property. But there was a lot of interest and we had had to take the property or we would miss out on it. We had spoken with our neighbours about how the landlord would react to us moving out, deposit ect.... and they said pretty much that he had been really awkward at giving deposits back.... to the extent that he tried to doctor a final gas/electrcity bill to keep as much of previous tenants deposit as possible. I think you get the idea as to what kind of land lord he is. Anyway, we decided to move out giving a months notice but we did not pay for the month. Instead we informed our landlord to keep our deposit to cover that rent instead. If he had any issues with the property he could then discuss it with us and we could come to an agreement with any costs or work that was needing done. He came back saying that we had to give 2 months notice (although we are on a rolling monthly contract) and that we had to pay all outstanding costs into his account within 48 hours or he would persue legal action. He also got really personal with his text messages saying things like me and my wife won't have a good xmas with our kids because we're poor and that he will be in Florida with 24 members of his family and that we remind him about how fortunate he is when other people struggle to makes ends meat. (Are you getting the idea as to what kind of person he is? lol) Anyway, I challenged him on the fact that his property is not on a buy to let mortgage (I heard this from a little birdy) and that I don't think he could take me to court on this basis. (It is worth noting that he has a number of property's so I don't think that he will have consent to let from his mortgage provider) I have not heard back from him in the last 24 hours. Does anybody know whether, if it is true that he does not have a buy to let mortgage, he can take me to court or is he leasing this property out illegally? Any advice wold be very much appreciated. Thank you guys, Scott

My family were given 6 weeks notice by our landlady that she would require her property back due to a family situation. The date she wanted the tenancy to end was the 10th December with was our rolling renewal date as we were out of the 12 months term. As it was close to Christmas and we have 2 very young children we decided we would rather move asap and started looking for somewhere else straight away. (I didn't know at this point that she should have given us at least 2 months notice) We found a property and I told the landlady that we would like to move out on the 27th November and pay rent up to this date, then we were unable to hire the van we needed for that date and had to change the moving date to the 22nd November. When I told her this she said she would have accepted payment to the 27th but not the 22nd as that wasn't enough notice, and stated that we were liable to pay rent up until the 10th December. I then found out that legally she should have given us 2 months notice, and wrote to her he explaining that as she hadn't given us the correct notice her self and wanted the house back anyway surely she could be more flexible. She replied stating that she would be willing to split the difference in rent due to the 10th December, which would have cost us a lot more then if we'd just had to pay her to the 27th which she said she'd accept in previous correspondence! As it stands now I have paid the rent up to 22nd November which was the date we moved out, she hasn't yet paid back our deposit and is waiting for our response regarding what she considers the outstanding rent (approx £180). I posted the keys through the letter box on the day we moved out as we were moving quite far away and would not be able to go back to meet her at the property to hand over the keys, I made her aware of this and sent her a message after I left telling her I had done so. I know she went in to the property that night to collect the keys and check the house, she also contacted the utility companies to tell them we had moved out. What I would like to know is does she have any legal right to claim anymore rent from us from the date we moved out? I do not think we should have to pay her anymore given the circumstances, but need to know my facts before I contact her again. Many thanks in advance.

Hi, don't know where to post this so here goes, my daughter took on a house by a private landlord , he wanted rent in advance and a bond, she told him she didn't have all the money up front so he accepted a months rent in advance and so much bond and said she could pay the rest when she had it as he just wanted someone in the property, She no sooner moved in he started pestering her for the rest of the bond, she told him she didn't have it until after Christmas, she had a months rent due on her old property which was to be paid to the landlord for that house, he suggested my daughter phone housing benefits and tell them to send rent directly to her so that she could give him it to cover the bond, She refused saying that would be fraud , he then phoned housing benefits himself and tried to get this rent which was for previous landlord,he then started turning up at the house an at one point started swearing at my daughter then phoned housing benefits swearing at them over this bond, he has been going to the door banging and knocking for 15 minutes at a time my daughter is too frightened to answer the door. She has been to see housing benefits and the police, as he has now give her a section 21 of the housing act, this the housing benefits has said is wrong , it is not section 21 for this case, he has now been to my door threatening he needs to speak to her before he goes to the police to have her charged for deception ,fraud, and all sorts ,should he being doing this as he spoke very loud so that my neighbors could hear him,should i report him for this and does it go against the data protection, it was almost as though he was threatening me.

Hi We moved into property on 19 November and at that time we paid both our months rent in advance and the bond. Since then, we have been asking time and time again if they have protected the bond and also for their bank details so that we can pay them the rent (we get housing benefit but have to pay an excess also). At present the housing benefit is paid fortnightly to me , but the first two weeks were paid by cheque to the landlord. They got in touch today re the bond saying they had asked their bank re Deposit Protection and they had never heard of it! Hmmmm Sent them details of the government website re the scheme and said that it was law to protect the deposit within 30 days. Got reply back saying that they would now prefer to hand us the deposit back and get the rent direct from the council (minus our excess). Where do we stand? Would we need to have a new contract with them?

Hi all, My friend is in rather a awful fix. I helped her move into a new room within a houseshare last week, and when I arrived the room, and indeed the entire house was filthy. Ashtrays everywhere, stank of stale smoke and the room itself was in a state. Distressed, she broke down into tears and clearly I decided I would put her up at mine and help her find something else. The apartment was clean during her viewing, and nothing like the state it was in when we arrived. Prior to the move in, she paid £500 to secure the room. The room was advertised via an estate agency. The room itself was let by someone who is already a tenant of the property (therefore a sublet) without the consent of the landlord. No agreement was at any point signed. The landlord is apparently furious she has tried to do this and is taking her to court for unpaid rent already. The landlord and agency have both contacted the current tenant to return the money who initially returned £200 of the money and has since refused to return the rest stating that she has 'spoken to citizens advice bureau and she is within her right to keep the money'. My question is, having not stayed or even moved into the room, are we not entitled the full amount back? Has she contravened one or several laws by not having a contract, not putting a deposit into a government scheme and also for subletting a room without the landlords consent? I am at a loss to help her, and I know there are some incredibly knowledgeable people on this forum and am turning to you all for help. I have read through some similar posts and it seems the only option is to recover via the Small Claims Court, but I would love some advice on if I should report this to the police as theft, or can I claim interest on the amount owed (I have read 8% APR calculated daily on the amount owed?). I have read that if a landlord does not enter a deposit into a scheme then as per the law introduced in April 2007 we are entitled to 10x the deposit back. Not sure if this stands however as no contract was signed...). The agency have tried to help as best they can but now all calls and letters are being ignored. They are happy to provide logs of emails and provide a statement to support our case. Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you so much in advance

I was in a tenancy that ended back in July. After repeated, failed attempts to get the landlord to use the dispute service offered by the deposit protection company I had to start a small court claim to recover my deposit. Once the court claim started the landlord then agreed to use the dispute service (without informing me!) offered by the deposit company. However also the landlord issued a counter claim blaming me because she couldn't let the flat for a few weeks after I left, it says I didn't give her enough access to the flat so she is claiming a few weeks rent. I send a defence to counterclaim disputing this. I now have most of my deposit recovered after the dispute service has given it's verdict. Now from the court I have been given a court date and asked to pay £165 court fees. As my deposit is now returned I don't want to go to court as except for claiming costs there is nothing for me to gain and I will lose pay as self employed to attend court which will not be covered by any returned costs. Do I still have to go to court just to defend the counterlcaim even though the original claim is now resolved as I have received the deposit back ? I had a look and the court website and it says I will be liable for any of the defendants fees if I do not pay court costs now. Surely it is not right that we will go to court on just a counterclaim and I have to pay for it ? Thanks in advance....

Hi, I would need some advice on my case, as I believe that my landlord is trying to keep all my deposit unlawfully. I'll try to keep it short: My tenancy started on July 2008; the agency prepared an inventory which I still have. I moved out two weeks ago, my tenancy lasted 4 years and 4 month I never received a TDS certificate; I also asked my landlord a week ago about it but he's avoiding the question. I checked the website of the deposit schemes but I couldn't find any information about my deposit. My landlord didn't give me enough time to clean the flat; the day I was moving he sent a friend to check the flat and get the keys from me. I told him that I wanted to clean the flat after moving all my stuff, yet when I was returning from the first trip to collect more stuff I found his friend that had already cleaned the living room and he was moving on the bathroom. I was still collecting my stuff. When I asked him for the deposit, he claimed that the flat was dirty and that he had to change the carpet, clean the sofa and change the mattress. He claimed I was responsible for all these repairs. I never stained mattress, carpet or sofa. Sofa was dirty to usage, and it was 2 years old when I first moved in. The carpet was hovered during my tenancy, but I believe that it was all due to tear and wear. It was also in "fair conditions" when I moved in according to the inventory The mattress was also old; I never stained it. It has gotten old due to usage (I lived there for over 4 years) I offered to pay for cleaning of the sofa and for toaster / kettle (which I threw away by mistake, I thought they were my gf), but I didn't accept responsibilities for other repairs, which I believe are due to tear and wear He gave me a list of costs sustained by him to make the repair and he didn't accept my claim of tear and wear. He also has some pictures taken by his friend while cleaning (showing the carpet and some of the appliance dirty, along with a shot of the sofa dirty) There is a picture of the mattress, however too little is shown that he can prove that I damage it I asked for all receipts, but he didn't provide me all of them. The carpet one is missing, along with his friend's cleaning payment. The receipts that he sent me do not match his breakdown and one of them is just a bank transfer The main issue is that the garden door has started having issue in closing properly around 2 years ago. I never reported this to him because it was not a problem. Basically there are twin doors and one of them needs to be slightly lifted in order to close the other door. It looks like the door joint is down 1/2 centimetre. He asked about this, and he now said that he had a quote of £2100 because he has been told that the door is broken and it needs to be replaced When I asked for the quote, he sent me a PDF with a quote for the full door (it's 4 glass panels, two moving ones), and also the quote includes full replacement of the bedroom window (which the problem is apparently condensation) Apparently he has been told that "it looks like force has been applied to the door". I never had done anything to push the door down; it simply started after 2 years of usage Bottom line, he doesn't want to give me back anything of the £850 of the deposit on the ground that he had to make the repairs mentioned above, and on top of that he has to foot the bill to replace door and window. I think that he's trying to take advantage of me and use my money to redecorate his place. I feel that he's been unfair with tear and wear judgement and I really want to take him to court and trying to get my money back I also feel like he's using the garden door issue as intimidation; I don't think that I'm liable for it, but I fear that he can use this against me in case I take him to court. I also think that it is not reasonable to change the whole door just to fix a door that is not closing properly. I wanted to get some legal advice but it is quite expensive and I don't want to spend some more money if I can't recover it later. I would really appreciated some advice / opinion on my issue before to proceed legally. Many thanks in advance, A disgruntled tenant

Good morning ladies and gents I must be short of a few things upstairs, as I have browsed through the categories and couldn't find anything related to tenancy issues. Could someone point me in the right direction please:|

I am having problems getting my deposit back from my previous landlord who say that they do not have it to give to me. When I took out the tenancy back in 2005 I paid my deposit to the rental agency, the landlord then changed over to using a new agency and I signed a new tenancy agreement... all was well until a few months ago when i tried to get my deposit repaid and am now told that no-one collected the deposit from the original agency who have recently gone bust - they are now telling me that since they do not have my deposit then they cannot repay me. Back in 2005, I got two letters... One letter from the old agency saying they were sending the deposit to my landlord. The other was from my landlord stating that he was passing over the deposit to the new rental agency and there was nothing for me to do or worry over. I have the new tenancy agreement that states that a deposit was paid and for the correct amount. So the paperwork from the new agency does state that a deposit was paid by me. if the landlord or the new agency did forget to collect my deposit from the previous agency, then is this a valid reason for them to refuse to refund me my deposit, or is there is a case for me at the small claims court to recover my deposit? All help and any comments or thoughts would be very much appreciated

Hello all, I haven't been on CAG for a while (previously related to credit and debt issues), however, I now wish to clarify the situation regarding unprotected deposits. Briefly, we have an AST (commenced Apr '08) that is now continuing as a periodic and the deposit was never protected at it's commencement. We are still tenants, and will be continuing as such for the immediate future, however, we wish to submit a claim for return of the deposit and, if appropriate, for 3x deposit plus any allowable costs and interest charges as well. However, in reading up on here I am somewhat confused as the law which covers this issue appears to have been subject to various case law interpretations and revisions since it's origination. The sticky threads on here all appear to relate to 2008 but later posts seem to contradict some of those earlier comments. There also appears to be issues between submitting a N208 or an N1 claim since one appears to be for purely return of a deposit and the other for a wider claim. I've been reviewing various posts and it looks like whilst previously, being a continuing tenant did not preclude claiming for return of the deposit plus a penalty, now one can only claim for the penalty. For example the following thread provides useful information but it appears out of date when compared to other comments elsewhere. http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?126261-TDS-Court-Claims-Wording If someone could perhaps point me in the direction of the relevant posts that can shed any light on this I would appreciate it. Many thanks UOTE

Hi, I have spent quite a lot of time on this forum to try to get some info regarding my problem, though most of what I've read is very helpful, I was hoping you could get me some advice for my particular situation... I have rented a room in a house during 6 months and lived with the landlord. I've moved out of the house 4 months ago. On my departure, the LL gave me £100 out of the £280 deposit back in cash and said to me she would make a bank transfer soon for the rest but I'm still waiting for the money and she is now completely ignoring me. What can I do knowing that: 1) The deposit was not protected, as I lived with the LL, the LL doesn't have to protect it. 2) The only written agreement I have is a receipt of the deposit I gave her (£280) when I moved in, saying that a one-month notice was needed before moving out (no info regarding when I would get the deposit back) 3) I mostly paid her cash, weekly (except the last month, by bank transfer after giving her notice of my departure). I have always given her the money directly and on time. 4) I don't have a receipt of part of the deposit (£100) she gave me back on my departure, but my boyfriend who was helping me to move out was there when she handed me the money and said she would repay the rest (£180) later. 5) I have a text message from her saying the money would be in my bank by the end of September 6) In this same text message, she is making-up things, saying the night I gave her notice, she found out I had stopped the direct debit without notice and paid her one week late (which is not true), therefore she would deduct one week from the deposit she is supposed to repay. But before I gave her notice, I had never paid her by bank transfer, only cash and a direct debit had never been set up. Also, I had really paid her one week late, why wouldn't she have said anything about it when I left as we lived together? She is lying, which shows she is clearly trying to get away with this. 7) My LL does no longer show any sign of cooperation, she's ignoring me. I have stopped trying to get in touch with her but told her I would be taking legal advice to recover the deposit, saying that she has had sufficient opportunity to to repay my deposit but she has failed to do so in the time frame she had previously indicated in her text message to me. So basically, I am trying to get my deposit back, worth £180, from my old dodgy LL. I know I should have been more vigilant but at least now that's lesson learned for me! I am going to call the Citizens Advice Bureau to get some help but from what I have read on this forum and on the Internet, my only alternative here would be to send her a letter (from two different post offices with proof of postage, keeping a copy of the letter with me) giving her 14 days to repay the rest of the deposit otherwise I will have no alternative but to take this dispute to the small claims court. Do you have any extra advice? Thanks a lot!

I am in the UK, I have lived in my flat for 5 years, I lease through a letting agency. Up until last January everything was fine, but I got sick and was also made redundant. I fell into arrears, my letting agents were very slack and didn't chase me and I was very slack in paying. I was unemployed for a year but recently got back to work and decided I wanted to tackle paying my arrears as I didn't want them festering, I thought I was being wise. They verbally agreed to accept an extra £50 a week on top of my rent back in May and have been accepting it since fine. A few weeks ago the property owner started asking questions, the letting agents submitted a repairs report to him which obviously stirred him to asking about how things were going. It seems they hadn't kept him informed and now they are getting very aggressive saying they want more money, money that I don't have. It has come out of the blue and is very upsetting as I had been maintaining my verbal agreement with them fine. The last message I got was to say that if I don't pay them a substantial amount next week they will take "legal action". To add an extra quirk into the mix I signed a 6 month lease when I moved in 5 years ago but we didn't renew it, just let it roll. What I was hoping to find out is as I have no formal lease do I have any rights at all? Do they have to complete an eviction process or can they just change the locks? I am looking for another property and will move out in a few weeks (my family will go guarantor and I have enough for a months rent), but in the meantime I would like an idea of where I stand. I know that if I had a signed contract I would have right but as I don't then I am not sure what the state of play is. The arrears are substantial and it would take me a long time to pay them, if they had maintained the ongoing arrangement I would not have decided to leave and the arrears would have eventually been cleared.

I wrote a while ago on here how I took my landlord to court for non return of my deposit. The judge awarded in my favour and issued an order for the Landlord to pay my £375 deposit plus 1x deposit. Since then the Landlord has made a counterclaim and has fabricated evidence saying that I caused £1100 worth damage to a radiator and a matress. During the first hearing of the counter claim the Landlord failed to present any evidence so the Judge set another date for the hearing. As I did not recieve any evidence prior to the hearing I did not attend the court hearing. During the hearing when I was not present, the Judge awarded in favour of the Landlord. The Judge served an order for me to pay the Landord £1100 despite the fact the order has already been served for the Landlord to pay me £375 + £375. Of this amount £375 still remains outstanding. Was correct not to attend the hearing as no evidence had been sent to me therefore I had no case to defend? Has the Judge made a mistake in issuing the order without me having the opportunity to defend myself? The hearing was 2 months ago and today I have recieved an attachment of earnings form from my landlord as they seek to recover the money owed to them via my employer. Where should I go from here?

I'm privately renting a flat and last week my boiler broke leaving me with no hot water and no heating. I let the landlord know on Thursday 1/11/12 and he booked a plumber who came on Monday 5/11/12. The plumber filled out a gas safety certificate and said that the boiler needs a new pressure switch. The landlord says he has ordered the pressure switch and will have it fitted towards the end of next week. Would it be unreasonable to ask to have it done sooner as by then I will have been without either heating or hot water for 2 weeks. I've had to wash by boiling the kettle and filling up the sink but it's getting cold and I have long hair that's very difficult to wash in the sink.