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Data Protection Act Laws Affecting Landlords

Published 06/02/2012

By Mark Alexander, landlord and founder of Property118

Part of Landlords Log, Mark's Personal Blog

Do you think Landlords need to have a Data Protection Licence?

My opinion of this is that the rules are very clear. Any person carrying on business who holds personal and/or financial data about other people should be licensed and take proper care to protect any data they hold, whether that’s computer or paper records.

To quote the Information Commissioners office “If you handle personal information about individuals, you have a number of legal obligations to protect that information under the Data Protection Act 1998.”

Landlords hold all sorts of data which qualifies for Data protection including tenant applications, tenancy agreements, references, National Insurance numbers, copy payslips, copy passports and driving licences, etc. etc. etc.

As tenants become more and more legally savvy you can bet that some will be looking for every opportunity to push you into any hole that you dig for yourself. This also extends to sharing information. For example, if you share information about a tenant with a referencing company you had better be sure that you have made provisions in your tenancy agreement and/or your tenant application forms for the tenant to grant you permission to do this. The time to get this permission is before you hand over they keys, once you have done so you’ve lost your power.

It is very easy for people to check whether you have a Data Protection Act Licence, they just do a search here

If you are in any doubt as to what I am saying please leave a comment and also check this link.

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About Mark Alexander
Mark and his family have been investing in property since 1989, initially in the Norwich area but more recently across the length and breadth of England. Mark created Property118.com as a social network for landlords with a vision of becoming the UK's largest online property community and the best respected property services directory and landlord news. Mark's experiences and strategies as a landlord are shared here Email - mark@property118.com

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2 Comments »

  • Ian Ringrose

    Thanks Mark, a very useful post,

    I have always believed that the basic rule with Data Production is:
    “Tell people what you will do with their data before you get the data,
    and then look after their data as if it was your data.”

    Personally I don’t think the Information Commissioners will care if a landlord with a handful of properties has a Data Protection Licence.   However I totally agree that you need to take good care of personally data and make it very clear at the START how you will be sharing information with other people/companies.

    In a lot of cases permission to share information will be assumed, e.g. if  you get a possible tenant to fill in a 3rd party reference check form,  then it is clear the information is going to that 3rd party.   Telling a “network” referencing setup about a problem with a tenant is a very different matter and also opens up all sorts of problems with libel laws etc!

    So if I was to rent directly (without using an agent) I would be looking for a RGI policy that included the reference checks and hopefully informing the “network” referencing setup if there is a problem.   Then the data protection issues will mostly not be my problem.

    I would however still like some working that let me inform other landlords directly or indirectly about any problems I have had.   Does anyone have a good set of wording?  (It needs to cover new network referencing type systems not just current ones)

    (Yes, if you are on the scale of Mark, then you had better have a full registration and trick every box, as you will be seen as a target and no one will feel sorry for you – but at the other end of the spectrum acting “reasonably” and informing everyone in writing how you may use information is likely to be enough to keep you out of problems.)

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  • http://www.property118.com/ Mark Alexander

    Hi Mike

    I needed a DPA licence for other business purposes but at the time I was advised to include my lettings business. Who are info com? I dealt with the ICO (Information Commisioners Office) as they are the body responsible for Data Protection, perhaps you should check with them. Feel free to report back here. I strongly recommend you to ask them to confirm their advice in writing.

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