Context from the Form: “4.3 The most recent rent increase (if applicable) was on… Note 4.3: If there has not been a rent increase since the start of the tenancy, leave blank. [Day] [Month] [Year]”
I have had a tenant since 30th October 2003. The original rent in the tenancy agreement was £360 per week (though they pay monthly). In 2019, we mutually agreed to an informal rent increase to £369 per week, and no Section 13 notice was served at that time. I do not remember the exact date the increase took effect.
What date do I enter for “The most recent rent increase (if applicable)” if the 2019 increase was entirely informal? Do I still need to find and input the 2019 date, or should I leave it blank because no formal Section 13 notice was served back then?
Not sure what you mean by 'entirely informal". It didnt need to be by a s13 notice to be formal or legally valid
It doesn’t matter how it was agreed or documented (written, verbal, smoke signals..). The form doesnt specify that the increase needs to be formal nor that it has to be by s13. Put the 2019 increase date down
Thank you for the clarification. I understand that the form asks for the date of any rent increase, regardless of how it was agreed (written, verbal, or informal).
My issue isn’t about the legal status of the 2019 increase—I know it’s legally valid because the tenant paid it. My issue is that I genuinely do not know the exact date it started.
Because it was agreed verbally and paid in cash initially, I have no bank trail or written paperwork to find the exact day and month. If I just ‘put the 2019 increase date down’ by guessing, I am entering an unverified date onto a strict statutory form.
Since my tenant has legal aid, their lawyer will likely demand proof of that 2019 date at the Tribunal. If I cannot prove the date I wrote down is 100% accurate, the notice can be thrown out as factually incorrect.
Given that a guess could invalidate the whole notice, how do I safely fill out this box when the exact date is impossible to verify?I cannot afford to get this wrong. I have already had a previous Section 13 notice thrown out and declared invalid because I listed the rent increase as a monthly figure (reflecting how they actually pay me) instead of the weekly figure stated in the original tenancy agreement.
Because the Tribunal evaluates these forms with absolute, unforgiving precision, guessing a past date feels like a massive gamble with a legal aid lawyer watching. If the exact date cannot be proven, is there a legally safe way to complete this section, or will any entry be a trap?
so you agreed a rent increase and it happened and you have no records either from when it happened or when the first payment was received? No receipt given to the tenant or even a thank you message for agreeing or for paying the increased amount. Not a text or email?
Just put the year or maybe the first date you can prove based on payments into a bank account at the time. Im guessing you know what date the rent payments were due and the amount so can check your bank records at the time. Anyway so what if it is a couple of months later than the original increase that happened in cash. On what grounds do you think the notice could be thrown out just because the date is slightly wrong. The issue for the tribunal is not what the rent was then or exactly when it happened- it is what is the market rate now. It dies not matter whether you are increasing after 6 years and 1 month or 6 years and 2 months
The reason to record the date of the latest increase is to record what happens and for RRA to make sure you dont increase more than once in a 12 month period.
If you ignore the 2019 increase how will you explain the discrepancy between the original amount in the contracts and recent paynents from sometime in 2019 onwards? That would be much more obviously misleading and would prove there’s been an increase and if you tried to hide it it looks far worse doesnt it.
Get some legal advice but telling the court the truth or your best estimate of the increase date even if it just states the year - which you ard certain of - is usually a better approach than telling it something that is demonstrably completely untrue (ie if you pretend there was no 2019 increase)
Ps if you are still getting the same rent as 2019 and you arent happy about it, and “cannot afford to get wrong” get legal advice dont rely on advice from fora.
Tbh if you cant come to a sensible deal with tenant on what the increase should be, I’m not sure that going through the tribunal to increase is going to help. If they dont want to or cant affort to pay they wont. So you are looking at 3 months further before you can serve s8 on rent arrears with a 4w notice period and after that apply for possession taking many months more to evict (applications for possession bailiffs ) . Worth considering biting the bullet and selling now (using the s8 grounds to evict 4m notice)
No, I meant it as written, but applied to the form field in question. Previously you only needed to use that field to record the date of the last s13 increase, but now its to record the last increase by any means.
I think if you ‘best guess’ the date this will be fine, but be ‘confident’ about it if questioned. Can the tenant prove you were wrong.
Just to check, they were paying ‘monhtly’ in 2019 weren’t they, as if payments were actually paid weekly (rather than being due weekly but paid monthly), then a written record rent book legally would have been required.
Yes, I think I should go by the date they first started paying via bank transfer. They started transferring the money directly into my account in October 2020. Although the rent increase actually started in 2019 and was always paid in cash, October 2020 is the very first date I can firmly prove they always paid monthly never weekly.
There is another complication: the tenants always made us sign for the cash payments, so there is a very good chance they can actually prove the exact 2019 start date. We never kept a rent book ourselves—which I know was a silly mistake—so we don’t have our own record of those signed receipts.
Because of this, my plan is to use the October 2020 date when they transitioned to bank transfers, as that is the first date I can firmly prove from my end. I am hoping the Tribunal might ignore it if the tenants try to argue it actually started on a specific date back in 2019.
A) tenant hasnt kept their records so nobody can prove when increase was and your bank records are the best evidence available- in which case you have no problem they cant prove the date you put is wrong
Or
B) tenant can prove the rent increase was from a specific date in 2019 and your form gets thrown out. You then simply resubmit with the date provided by the tenant, which will be a matter of record.
Neither A nor B ultimately stop your propoed s13 rent increase being considered by the Tribunal. B just delays it and you lose the increase for a longer period (increases are not backdated once decided by the Tribunal).
It may be worth employing someone with the right legal expertise and experience to check your form over.
Tbh if i couldnt agree a sensible increase with a tenant after such a long time and they were going to such lengths to avoid a rent increase after no increase in 6 years i would have used s21 before may 1; and failing that now would be looking at selling the property and serving s8 accordingly. Why on earth would you want to keep renting to such a tenant? Either you are asking too much so they cant afford or dont want to and they wont pay anyway even if you get the increase agreed by the Tribunal or they are being unreasonable and expecting never to have any rent increase.
I dont think the FTT will be too concerned by the slightly differing dates as for rent increase disputes theyre only concerned that the period between them is at least 12 months and that the new rent is not above the market average.
Do you have a copy of your tax return from that year, as this will show the income received on that property in that year, so you may be able to work out how many payments at old & new rate.
My dad and I didn’t know about the Section 13 process for years, so we always just asked the tenants for informal rent increases. They always made excuses, claiming the council didn’t pay them enough housing benefit.
I only discovered the Section 13 route last year. On that first application, I didn’t want to be unfair, so I only requested a modest increase to £420 per week. However, they responded by making false claims to the Tribunal—asserting that they maintained the property themselves and had laid multiple floors out of their own pockets.
Since they decided to make up lies, I have completely dropped the lenient approach for this new application. I am now increasing the rent to the full market value of £650 per week. This is one of the best properties I own—a 4-bedroom semi-detached house in Wimbledon—and I have absolutely no desire to sell it. My hope is that once the First-tier Tribunal approves the true market value, the tenants will simply choose to move out, as they won’t be able to afford it.