A new legal organisation says legal advice to the lettings sector concentrating on the Renters Rights Act may be missing a key threat.
Edward Romain, founder and chief executive of Blind Justice UK, writes on the Legal Futures website that items like periodic tenancies, the end of fixed terms, the abolition of section 21 have dominated the legal advice going out to rental sector clients.
But he warns that this advice “has been aimed at the wrong risk.”
He says a bigger compliance threat than the Renters Rights Act is actually the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCCA).
This Act’s consumer protection provisions came into force in April 2025 and has operated, to some extent, under the radar.
Romain says the big difference in terms of compliance risk is enforcement.
“The Renters’ Rights Act is enforced, in the main, one tenant at a time, through the courts. That is slow and reactive, and for an operator with thousands of units the practical risk from any single breach is modest.
“The DMCCA works in the opposite direction. It gives the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) a direct enforcement model: the regulator can decide for itself that a business has breached consumer protection law and impose a penalty of up to 10% of global annual turnover, without first having to win in court.”
He suggests that private rental sector clients may not raise concerns with legal advisers over the DMCCA because they do not see the issue as legal.
But Romain warns: “A single defective tenancy notice affects one tenant. A non-compliant pricing convention affects every listing on the platform, and it is visible to the regulator from the outside, without anyone having to complain.”
And he tells the legal industry that a firm confining its advice to the likes of tenancy structure and notice periods, and doesn’t consider consumer-protection exposure, may be missing the larger threat.
You can see his interesting article here: https://www.legalfutures.co.uk/blog/your-landlord-clients-have-prepared-for-the-wrong-law
