London landlord Victoria Whitlock, who writes a weekly column as The Accidental Landlord in the free Evening Standard newspaper, has given a sharp warning about the possible side-effects of the Home Office's new right to rent rules.
Under these, letting agents and landlords have to conduct tests on the right of migrant prospective tenants to be in the UK. The scheme is currently being piloted in the West Midlands but will be rolled out across the country in 2015.
Under the scheme tenants are expected to produce documents to prove their right to be in the UK. These include a range of documents drawn from a passport, birth certificate, driving licence, letter from an employer or from an edicational institute, or letter from a prison or probation officer.
I don't know about you, but I haven't a clue where my birth certificate is, I am self-employed and I haven't had the pleasure of being acquainted from anyone from HM Prison Service, so if I wanted to rent I would be stuffed if I didn't have a passport says Whitlock.
She says this scheme makes it harder for some Britons to find rental accommodation than some foreigners because the latter will have documentation - and if they do not, the Home Office has an online checking service.
Whitlock also says the need to keep tenants' data for a year after the end of the tenancy - insisted upon under the new right to rent rules - means that failure to do so, or the theft of such data from your system, could result in prosecution under data protection laws.
She concludes: The government says there is only a small number of illegal immigrants. So I am wondering, why have landlords been landed with all this extra bother
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Comments
I agree with the previous posts. It just seems to me that we must have inadequate resources allocated to UK border control which allows illegal immigrants to enter the UK in the first place.
As a result, Landlords and Agents are now tasked with sweeping up behind this issue Another ill-thought out policy imposed onto the PRS.
I am sure that reputable agents/landlords will comply with the regulations and reject these illegals as tenants. I know we will and are already changing our procedures and our computer system in readiness for the 2015 roll-out.
Years ago when I started smoking (stay with me on this - there is a point to it ! :D) there was no black-market for cigarettes. You paid your money and bought your fags. As the years went on various governments increased the duty on fags and tobacco so much so that it created a "black market".
I can see this happening in the PRS with this new legislation and it will only harm these immigrants. Unscrupulous agents and Landlords will simply cash in on this issue.
"Looking to Rent Been rejected due to your immigration status Talk To Us!". These agents and Landlords will flout the rules, house these people and inevitably charge these folk inflated rent and fees to house them. Why not It's only 3,000 if they get caught.
How is the process of checking the status of tenants going to work If the UK border force (and it seems to be) is under-staffed then I doubt the government will be able to police this. Local councils won't be able to as they are understaffed as it is.
Also - what do we do if we find someone who seems to be "illegal" in the country Do we have to report them Is there anyone left on the border force payroll to report them to
This is madness; if the government intend on imposing these regs then fine, but they should also be the ones to provide the proper software as well as training to do so.
I'm with Victoria on this. So, we've just let a home to a Russian gentleman at a rent of 8,000 pm. As a PROPERTY EXPERT with too many years in the business than I care to remember, I, nor my staff, wouldn't have a clue what to look for when "verifying" the "status" of this fine upstanding individual. The whole world has gone completely mad - driven by ineffective box ticking computer processes, useless screen facing box-tickers, and meaningless targets. My mother, who lives comfortably with no debt to her name, cannot obtain a 15 per month pay as you go phone as she doesn't work, cannot produce a bill with her name on, nor possesses a passport.