Penalty for late rent

Riccal

Hi all,

An enquiry on behalf of a friend of mine who has just signed on an AST on a one bed flat in Twickenham Rent £450 pcm.
On the contract is a clause stating that late payment of rent will result in a £30 penalty per day.

Could anyway tell me if that is enforceable or does it affect her statutory rights. Is that not too high a figure to represent true recompense to the landlord?

Cheers

Riccal

dkmax_2

Riccal wrote: »

Could anyway tell me if that is enforceable or does it affect her statutory rights. Is that not too high a figure to represent true recompense to the landlord?

A fixed daily rate is highly likely to be regarded as an unfair term and will not be enforceable in court.

Edit :- I would add that if this contract is through an agency, then you should report them to the local trading standards and also to their professional body - you might want to wait before doing so lest there be any repercussions for the tenant.

BitterAndTwisted

It's all immaterial anyway as your friend won't be paying the rent late, will she? £450 a month in Twickers sounds like a really good deal.

theartfullodger

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

It's all immaterial anyway as your friend won't be paying the rent late, will she? £450 a month in Twickers sounds like a really good deal.

Well, depends doesn't it, like most places some bits of Twickers are mingin'.. (trust me, I lived there...)

No, not enforceable - see OFT's guidance (Google OFT356) P80 & 81 etc etc...

Assuming your mate wants a happy life & a decent reference when they move on... (Ah!!!), suggest they pay on time... and in full... If they can't then try & negotiate an early surrender and go stay with mum/mates/sofa-surf....


Cheers!

Artful

Just for fun, ask the agent/landlord if paying early gets a discount of £30... bet they have no sense of humour. I only ask as one set of tenants of mine paid rent 7 days early this month... weird.. (or gone on hols...)

HappyMJ

It's not enforceable. It's just an empty threat to get you to pay up on time. Imagine 8 weeks arrears causing late fees of £30 each day for 28 days and £60 per day for 28 days. They then take another 8 weeks to get an eviction order so £90 for another 28 days and £120 for yet another 28 days. And another 5 weeks to actually kick you out. So a further £150 per day for 28 days and finally £180 a day for 7 days. If you add up all those figures you would owe £13,860 in late fees but only £2,700 in rent arrears. The court would never allow that.

RAS

Landlord not called Suzy Butler by any chance?

tbs624

It's a penalty payment at that level and thus likely to be deemed unenforceable by a court if challenged.

Just because such a clause is sitting there in a tenancy agreement, even signed up to by both parties, it does not mean that it can necessarily be relied upon.

LL drafted or produced by an LA ?

theartfullodger

RAS wrote: »

Landlord not called Suzy Butler by any chance|?

Well, Sunil Dhown of IRD homes fame opened his new restaurant just some 200mtrs from Twickers station

prudryden

Why did your friend agree to that clause in the contract?

iscoed

My son rented as a student with 5 others from a Letting Agency.

As he was lead tenant (only because the others were from around the country) it was put in his name. All deposits were taken seperately from the lads then held in Deposit Protection Scheme.

As students there were times when the rent was late but always paid.

At the end of the tenancy we applied for the return of the deposit .The money minus an agreed amount deducted by the Landlord for repainting etc was released. We were supposed to click the email to recover the money. Since we werent aware of the other boys bank account details and addresses we had asked the Letting Agent to do it...they said they didnt deal that. We had a couple of reminders from DPS and my husband telephoned them we were told that by then the Landlord had put in a claim for the balance of the money and the reason provided was unpaid rent. This was not true and we could enter and object. We telephoned the Letting Agent and was told that it was they who had asked for the money because they were fed up of the other Parents ringing and asking for the money. They said not to send in an objection as this would delay the payment of the money.

NOW, we are being told by the Letting Agents, they have the money and the Administrator in the office said she had made a mistake and that she was in trouble with the accounts department because she hadnt deducted fees for letters sent for late payment of rent, therefore they werent going to pay the deposit back.

When asked what fees they were talking about this is what she said...

36 x £17.63 for arrears letters

18 x £29.38 for guarantor letters

6 x £117.50 for Solicitors letter

So basically....all the £1852 that was owed to the boys!!

We could KICK ourselves because if we had just click the b.....dy button on the email...we would have had the money and they would have had to 'write off' the fees for letter due to the girls negligence.

What we want to know is....Why all these fees were left to accrue and no one EVER said anything for a whole year. And why, they are allowed to decide to charge us AFTER the deposit was agreed to be released. Can they do that?

Dont know if you follow all that?

The Solicitor letter mentioned....we have a reply from the Solicitor saying that they had word from the Letting Agents to say they would waive all the fees (to this particular late rent payment amount...It was our sons who a couple of months prior had tried to commit suicide so all was dropped...so we thought!)

theartfullodger

prudryden wrote: »

Why did your friend agree to that clause in the contract?

Tenants usually agree to c**p like this because if they don't they either won't, or suspect they won't, get the property & somewhere to lay their weary head. But I guess we all knew that eh??

Apologies, that was a bit too blunt... No offence intended PD...