opinons wanted about this 14 day rule

[mich_21]

hi there,

 

Just a bit of background: signed AST June 2008, with £2,400 deposit. Renewed Dec 2008 and again Dec 2009. Never received deposit scheme information, but as well, never requested it. Had problems with the flat Nov 2009, then checked deposit schemes. Of course, not registered!

 

Wrote letter of complaint, which was ignored. Then just last week, May 2010 after we've told him that we're moving out, I get an email from the DPS that he has only just registered it.

 

Now: obviously he didn't register within the 14 day period. Does this mean he's off the hook?

 

I've been reading through a lot of cases and it seems to go both ways: sometimes they adhere to the 14 day rule, and sometimes they don't because at the end of the day, it was protected.

 

What are your experiences/opinions?

[Kentish Lass]

You say that the deposit was £2,400 - what was the annual rent? If the £2,400 was a month's rent, your annual rent was over £25,000 - in which case the deposit was not covered by the deposit protection legislation.

 

And yes, some courts are being very pedantic about the actual wording of the relevant legislation and landlords are getting away with this late deposit protection.

 

At least if it is now protected you have a reasonable chance of getting the deposit back!

[mich_21]

Annual rent is just under the £25,000 mark. our deposit covers 6 weeks.

 

Pretty sure he won't give us our desposit back - our boiler broke down during winter and he had to throw a lot of cash into it to fix it and it's still not fixed properly - he's not planning to fix it, hence our move out.