Landlord deducting from deposit for 'cleaning'.

princeofpounds

You are being given the opportunity to provide evidence. The burden of proof is on the landlord but this is not a criminal court with proof beyond reasonable doubt required. The adjudicator will decide on the balance of evidence.

State your case, be brief and to the point. Condition going in, condition going out. No inventories or photos taken by the LL. Visual inspection by landlord!!!8217;s agent (his relative) said it was good condition.

Provide any evidence you have (photos? Contemporaneous receipts for cleaning or cleaning products?).

Wait. You should win, as the LL probably has no evidence given what you have said.

InterestedParty2018

Just to add the obvious - make sure you have an inventory record for the new place you have moved into.
If not, I suggest you take photos of any defects/similar now, email to your landlord/agent, so that there is a record for the future. Send from a private email address that you can refer back to in the future, and ask for a confirmation of receipt.

Tenant0212

Thanks for your post.

Luckily I'm no longer renting but if I ever do I will make sure to document every inch of a rental before and after. So far no response from the landlord after my refusal to his claim. Let's see how long this will take.

I'll keep you all updated whenever I hear something new.

Tenant0212

Just quickly wanted to mention that I've not forgotten about this but nothing has really happened. Still waiting for an update, still haven't received the rest of my deposit either.

SmashedAvacado

if the obligation is to leave the property clean, whether the property was clean when you took it isn't necessarily relevant.

Pixie5740

SmashedAvacado wrote: »

if the obligation is to leave the property clean, whether the property was clean when you took it isn't necessarily relevant.

The condition of the property at the start of the tenancy is entirely relevant and as someone who claims to be a landlord you should know that.

Tenant0212

Hi,

Not much has happened, still waiting for a response through the DPS scheme. Landlord has been e-mailing me directly but on advice here I've not been responding and doing everything through DPS.

Any idea how long this can go on for? I've requested the deposit back through the scheme, is there a maximum wait time on this?

Thanks!

SmashedAvacado

Pixie5740 wrote: »

The condition of the property at the start of the tenancy is entirely relevant and as someone who claims to be a landlord you should know that.

This isnt the case. You can have an obligation to return something clean despite it not being clean at the start. The problematic clause is the clause that says something like "in the same clean condition it was a the start of the tenancy". If you accept an obligation to hand it back clean, then it is for you, at the start of the tenancy to insist that it is clean, and not to take the tenancy until you are satisfied of this.

gingercordial

Tenant0212 wrote: »

Hi,

Not much has happened, still waiting for a response through the DPS scheme. Landlord has been e-mailing me directly but on advice here I've not been responding and doing everything through DPS.

Any idea how long this can go on for? I've requested the deposit back through the scheme, is there a maximum wait time on this?

Thanks!

It can take a while. You are going to have to be patient I'm afraid.

When I used the scheme I put a request in for the deposit return, having given up on arguing ourselves. It took about a week for the deposit service to open the case and invite the landlord to submit evidence for the deductions they wanted. The landlord had a 14 day window to submit this. I then had 14 days after that to respond to it all with my own evidence. Looking at my e-mails I put in my request on 6 October and my final deadline for evidence was 15 November. You can't speed this up - even if you submit everything on day 1 of your window it will stay open for the full 14 days before moving on to the next step.

They then "aim to" adjudicate within 28 days but it can be longer if they are busy. The award (in full to us :beer:) was made on 23 December and we had the money in about a week later given the bank holidays around that time. So almost three months all in all before seeing the cash back.

Tenant0212

So this morning I finally got an update from DPS, asking me to provide proof of my case.

As I've not taken any pictures before or after there is no 'proof'. Not to mention it seems backwards that I have to prove something isn't the case, shouldn't the onus be on the landlord?

Any advice here what to send them?

Thanks again!