Tenant sueing over unprotected deposit – A cautionary note

As landlords of some 30 years, we served notice on a tenant in October 2013 who had been with us for 10 years.

In 2003, when we initially rented the flat to this lady who worked for the NHS in HR in Wolverhampton, all was fine and dandy and at this time deposit protection wasn’t even born.

As the tenancy progressed the tenant became more difficult to manage and a complete hoarder. We took the view that this was becoming a risk to us, as our central heating guy wasn’t being let in to service the boiler and the amount of clutter and stuff piled into the flat was becoming a fire risk. We also could not carry out any renovation work as she had not reported certain issues with the flat that needed attention.

This is the important bit….. We didn’t protect her tenancy as she started with us before the law came into force. It just slipped through the net, not intentionally, but it did……… But 2 years after she left and a 17K refurb bill for us to bring the flat back to rentable standard, she is suing us for not protecting her deposit. To a tune of 15.3K …….. £390 x 3 x 13 tenancies ( 6 month assured shorthold tenancies ) …….

The irony is we’ve protected everyone since the act came into place religiously, but this one slipped through the net. It’s looking like a very costly mistake…….

The lady got her deposit of £300 back less a broken lamp shade at £15.00 after 10 years of abusing the flat, but is still suing for 15.3K which we feel is a little disproportionate. She did use her deposit as her last month’s rent which is against the tenancy agreement, but that doesn’t seem to matter to our solicitor.

So if you have tenancies that are not protected, get them registered now before you get stuffed like we currently are.

And if you rent flats in Tettenhall in Wolverhampton and took on a lady tenant in Jan 2014, best of luck……

Any advice or comments welcome !

Steve