Tenant referencing nightmare situation

jon142

Good Morning All!

I was hoping someone could help me.

I have lived in a property for 18months now, renting from a company who owns over 160 apartments in a major town.

The last 18 months have been a little rocky, the apartment car park has been broken into quite a few times and I now feel it's time to leave and move else where to a larger house.

So I began to search online for property. and I found one very quickly that was perfect.

Rent at the current place is £550, and at the new place is £675. easily and comfortably within my affordability.

I approached the letting agent who was charging a £205 admin fee to secure the property so it's mine and complete referencing checks.

I filled out the online form to Van Mildert, adding in my company information, where I live now, Salary etc.

I have had a phone call yesterday evening saying my reference check failed because where I currently live has said I have paid my rent late on more than 6 occasions.

When I originally took the £550 property out I took it on the 24 of the month, I didn't get paid till the 30/31 ( or last working day - so could be 28/29th) of the month, so at the beginning of the contract I printed out and kept an email I sent to the landlord agreeing to change the dates to the 1st of the month so it needs to be paid by the 1st of each month. (They agreed to the dates too.)

My Payment days go like this for the last year.

2014
Jan - 29th
Feb - 27th
Mar - 27th
April - 30th
May - 30th
Jun - 28th
Jul - 31st
Aug - 29th
Sep - 29th
Oct - 31st
Nov - 28th
Dec - 24th

Now on my tenancy agreement it states the payment must be made by the 24th, but we have an email trail agreeing that the 1st is fine and no problem.

Obviously when I have gone elsewhere to apply for rent they must be taking the 24th date.

The problem is now I have failed referencing based on the fact my current accommodation provider not giving an accurate reflection of the deal we had in place.

The new 675 Property people have gone running to the hills thinking I am a bad payer when i'm not at all.

I have all previous contracts / email trails etc explaining about the date change.

My current landlord has never given me any late payment letters / changed me any fees / was quite happy for me to renew my contract time and time again with them. (3 times in total)

Whats my best solution / what should I do / any feedback welcome

Thank you.

Pixie5740

Have you spoken with the LL/LA of your current home to ask about the reference given since you did have agreement to pay your rent late?

In future don't sign a contract saying that you'll pay your rent on the Xth every month if you can't do it. The date you get paid on is of no consequence to your LL.

jon142

Pixie5740 wrote: »

Have you spoken with the LL/LA of your current home to ask about the reference given since you did have agreement to pay your rent late?

In future don't sign a contract saying that you'll pay your rent on the Xth every month if you can't do it. The date you get paid on is of no consequence to your LL.

I am going to speak to them today about it, needless to say they are absolute idiots and probably won't rectify the situation.

You would think a simple email to change dates would be simply.

But why haven't they slapped me with late fees / told me I am paying late.

oldbaldman

jon142,

from your schedule your rent was late every month so by reporting that you paid late your current LL did accurately reflect the situation. They have a duty to be honest with any reference enquiries. The fact that they were okay with it, worked for you and them, but the prospective LL may not be okay with it? You could have saved a sum of money to ensure that at some point you caught up with your payments after a few months with your current LL, but chose not to or did not think about this.

Is this likely to effect any other credit reference checks that you might be subject to in the future?

Asking your current LL to help you out with a letter of explanation is your first move to see if you can rectify the situation. But your view that they are idiots for simply pointing out the fact of the situation is unlikely to get them on your side if they read about themselves here?

You could explain the situation to you proposed LL and offer to pay 2 or 3 months in advance, that way you would always be on time with your rent, if you get your dates right?

Just to add, it is not just a simple email to change things as you suggest above. You have a contract with your LL and the agency, that would need to be amended.

obm

HappyMJ

jon142 wrote: »

Whats my best solution / what should I do / any feedback welcome

Thank you.

Go somewhere else. Not the best advice but they now have a poor reference and won't change their mind now. I would ask your landlord to mark the payments as not late for the next reference they get asked for. You agreed to pay a few days late to coincide with your monthly pay so it isn't really late.

magpiecottage

If you have an e-mail agreeing to later payment that may amount to a collateral contract.We cannot know this with the limited information we have. An e-mail exchange may not suffice but, equally, it might.

If so then if you paid in accordance with the terms of the collateral contract no breach would seem to have occurred.

The landlord could say that you paid late by mutual agreement (as it would be true) but to simply say you paid late without such qualification would seem to be a breach of the Data Protection Principles.

On the other hand, if there is no collateral contract and the landlord simply chose to tolerate your tardiness then the reference would seem to be correct.

It may be worth looking here to see which might be relevant to you.

Guest101

This could easily be slander.

I would contact them and remind them of the email, stating that you want a new reference, or you will be seeking legal advice.

jjlandlord

magpiecottage wrote: »

The landlord could say that you paid late by mutual agreement (as it would be true) but to simply say you paid late without such qualification would seem to be a breach of the Data Protection Principles.

If you pay late "by mutual agreement" you do not pay late at all since the agreement was changed.
If they gave an incorrect reference, by mistake or otherwise, this does not breach data protection, but it might be some sort of slander if done knowingly.

jon142

Thanks for all the info guys!

Phoned up and visited my current landlords office.

They said in their email to Van Mildert, that I "paid rent between 3 and 5 days late", I have told them they allowed me to and they have agreed it wasn't late but it was agreed upon.

Van Mildert are now going to review my application and maybe over turn the referencing decision.

I think it's too late tho as the house will now be almost certainly gone as other where lined up to see it.

What a horrible situation.

oldbaldman

Hope it works out for you.

May have been worth following up it seems

obm