Deed of Covenant when assigning / transferring under the terms of the Lease

NeoTheMa3x

Hello,
I need some advise for an issue with my management company.
I am a sole owner of leased flat and have done remortgage on the property almost 2 years ago. During the remortgage I have managed to transfer the equity under my name as previously my cousin was a co-owner. Everything went well, I paid all fees to the solicitor and the landlord for the transfer of equity.
Since then I am paying my ground rent and all invoices are coming under my name.
However the landlord recently replaced the management agent and they issued an invoice with the new service charges under mine and my cousin's name (the previous management agent also had both our names under their invoices, but at that time I wasn't bothered by it). I have paid the charges, but then I emailed them saying they should remove my cousin's name from their invoices as he is no longer co-owner of the flat.
They responded that they need to speak with my solicitors as they will need some documents. So I got them in contact and soon after they have requested a Deed of Convenant and an administration charge for £120 just to remove the name and update their records!
Could someone advise if this is right and should they be asking for this? I am under the impression that the landlord should have already provided them with that information and they should not require any payment as they are just a third party in this case.
Any help is greatly appreciated!

eddddy

If your lease says that a deed of covenant is required for any transfer of ownership, then you must provide one.

If you don't, you'd be in breach of your lease, and the freeholder/management company could take legal action against you.

The law says the admin fee must be 'reasonable'. If you want to take things further, you could ask the management co for a breakdown of the £120 fee - in terms of what they will do, and how long it will take.

In some past cases, tribunals have agreed that a fee for admin work (like dealing with deed of covenant) of about £50+vat or £60+vat per hour is reasonable.

If it's about 1.5 to 2 hours of work, £120 is probably reasonable. If it's 15 mins of work, £120 is probably not reasonable.

NeoTheMa3x

Thanks for this eddddy, I completely understand what you are saying, however there is a grey area that I do not understand.
I have already paid the fee for name change to the freeholder (landlord), so why would I need to pay a third party company for the same thing? Shouldn't the freeholder be responsible and make them aware of this at the time of the remortgaging process?
Or this is just something my solicitors missed?

I have just checked my lease and it says: "Not to assign or transfer the whole of the property or grant a lease of the whole of the property  for a term in excess of seven years without: requiring the transferee or lessee to enter into a deed of covenant with the landlord to comply with the Tenant's obligations with the Landlord and the Manager as set out in this lease in accordance with that contained in schedule fourteen or in such other form as the landlord shall reasonably require and to provide a copy of the deed of covenant to the Landlord and to pay all reasonable and proper costs of and incidental to the preparation and execution of such deed including reasonable and proper fees payable on it (if any)"

NeoTheMa3x

Just an update on my situation,
I have pressed the third party service charge company to explain why I need to pay additional fees for something that happened year and a half ago, I said I paid all fees to my landlord and only request a name change on their records, nothing else.
After two weeks ago they finally responded that the change has been made and I don't need to pay anything.