Three-quarters of landlords don’t know about the new PRS database, raising fears that many will still be in the dark when it starts rolling out in December.

Under the Renters’ Rights Act, landlords face a £7,000 penalty if they fail to sign up, but the new August Landlord Survey reveals that only 23% of landlords are aware of the new landlord database and PRS ombudsman.

Local councils will be able to take enforcement action against private landlords who let or advertise a property without it first being registered on the database. They can be issued with a civil penalty of up to £7,000 and if they repeatedly fail to do this, can face a civil penalty of up to £40,000 or criminal prosecution.

Penalties

There will be similar penalties for the ombudsman service when this launches, with councils able to take action against landlords who fail to join, or against anyone who markets a PRS property where the landlord is not registered. Tenants can also seek rent repayment orders against their landlord if the landlord commits an offence by persistently failing to join the ombudsman service.

The property management platform found that just under half of those surveyed (46%) understand the Act and have already changed how they operate, while 35% understand the main points but have not yet acted. One in eight (12%) know the Act exists but do not understand the details, and 7% were not aware of it before taking the survey.

Familiar

Landlords were most familiar with the right of tenants to request a pet (59%), and the rule that rent can only be increased once a year by formal notice (55%).

Richard Samuel, chief executive of August, says landlords have done the hard work of understanding the parts of the Act that change how they let and how they evict. “What has not landed is that the database and the ombudsman are not optional extras for problem landlords; every landlord in England will have to register and sign up,” he adds.

“That is a communication failure the sector needs to fix before the registration deadline, because the penalties for not being on the database will fall on landlords who simply never heard about it.”

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