Enforcement action we can take
We welcome responsible landlords and want to work with you. However, if we do need to take formal action, there are a number of powers available to us. Below are the ones we most commonly use.
To assess the condition of a property, we use the Housing Health and Safety System.
All enforcement is carried out in line with our service standards for businesses and enforcement policy.
This is a notice informing a landlord of the hazards found in their rental property, what needs to be done about them and how long they have to take to do them. The notice can be appealed. Failing to comply with it is an offence, which carries an unlimited fine. We can carry out all or some of the required works to a rental property when a landlord fails to comply with the notice. All our costs for doing this can be recovered from the landlord. This is an order which prohibits or restricts part or all the property from use or certain uses. The order sets out the hazards found in a rental property and what needs to be done to have the order removed. The order can be appealed. Failing to comply with it is an offence, which carries an unlimited fine. Where there is an imminent risk of serious harm to the health or safety of occupiers or others we can do emergency works to make things safe. This is called emergency remedial action. We can also secure (board up) a building from unauthorised entry or to prevent it becoming a danger to public health. In circumstances where works would be inappropriate, an emergency prohibition order can be made, which prohibits or restricts part or all the property from use or certain uses immediately. The landlord is liable to pay all of our costs for carrying out emergency action. We use this type of notice when a property is a risk to health, for example having no hot water, or causing a nuisance to neighbouring properties, such as damp from one property affecting another. Failure to comply with this notice can lead to an unlimited fine and we can do works to carry out repairs ourselves. The landlord is liable to pay all costs involved. This is served on an owner or manager of a house in multiple occupation (HMO). We can require overall numbers of people to be reduced, stop unsuitable rooms from being used as bedrooms, or restrict bedrooms to certain numbers of people. The notice can be appealed. Failing to comply with it is an offence, which carries an unlimited fine. The Royal Borough may impose a civil penalty, as an alternative to prosecution, of up to a maximum of £30,000 for the following offences: We can issue a civil penalty of up to £5,000 if a landlord doesn't comply with the Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015. We'll also carry out the works to install the necessary alarms. Civil penalties can be appealed. If you don't pay a civil penalty we'll try to recover the debt through the county courts. A Rent Repayment Order (RRO) requires a landlord to repay a specified amount of rent (up to 12 months) in certain circumstances. We can make an application to the First Tier Tribunal (FTT) for a RRO to recover benefit payments related to housing, where the landlord has: Tenants can also make applications for an RRO where they have being paying all or part of the rent themselves.