TDS service not available after leaving property

[Sands34m]

My landlord (through his letting agent) has refused to return any of my deposit. I disputed this, and after 5 weeks of unsuccesfully trying to negotiate (in fact i was getting no responce) I contacted the TDS service who informed me the landlord had "recently decided not to be members of the scheme anymore".

 

Is this legal, and how long after the end of tenancy does the scheme 'safeguard' the deposit for ??

 

please help, i'm running into so many brick walls.

[coppullcaveman1]

Hi Sands, when did the membership of the scheme terminate ? was it after your tenancy ended or before ? If it was an insurance based scheme and you have the information I would suggest that the scheme is still liable, give us some more info on which scheme was used

[Sands34m]

Hi Sands, when did the membership of the scheme terminate ? was it after your tenancy ended or before ? If it was an insurance based scheme and you have the information I would suggest that the scheme is still liable, give us some more info on which scheme was used

 

The scheme used was the Tenancy Deposit Scheme, and when i asked for a date they stopped the service they would only say "recently".

I then asked whether I was still able to open a dispute, and

"The deposit was registered within our scheme, but as i have previously mentioned your Agent is no longer a member of our scheme and arranging alternative arrangements to have that protected..." and "If you wish to raise a dispute there would be a charge to the agent, however the agent may choose not to pay this fee and would have to forward your dispute to the company they are now using to protect deposits" replied this morning!!

 

I did ask the landlords agents who they were now using to protect my deposit by email, and copied that letter to the landlord at the house I rented (as his only known UK address) over 14 days ago but have received no reply.

 

They are just not answering any of my queries, they have charged me for cleaning (when the house was spotless and the cleaning contractor has confessed to me they were told to clean the whole house and quoted without seeing the state of it), they took some personal belongings from the garage of the property (4 days before my tenancy agreement ended, although after I had vacated the property in the main), and they billed me for removing the lock.. (my tenancy was still valid at that point)...

[coppullcaveman1]

I`m far from being an expert on this and I am unsure if a deposit can be unprotected once it has been placed with a scheme without consent from both tenant and landlord.

The DPS is the ONLY scheme that allows a deposit to be registered with them after the 14 days from when the landlord received the deposit so that scheme would be the only alternative. Do you have the information regarding the fact that the deposit was protected ? Tenancy code or anything like that ? I have just spoken to your scheme who said the agent is still liable to pay you the money and admitted that should you raise a dispute with Tenancy Deposit Scheme they are obliged to chase this up on your behalf and fulfil their obligations. Alternatively you can take the agent to court , this could be a good course of action if protection has been removed from your deposit , as appears to be the case . I am ASSUMING this was an AST ?

Edited August 11, 2010 by coppullcaveman1
Assumption

[Sands34m]

yes, it was an AST.

The TDS will not give me a date that the LL agent stopped using their service, should they have to provide me with that information?

Will the dispute service take into account my belongings removed from the property, or am I better going through the courts?