I have written quite a few posts involving the DPS on Landlord Law over the years since the scheme went live. I thought in the leadup to my interview with Kevin Firth (DPS Director) next week on tenancy deposits, it might be interesting to look back at some of them.
Lets start off with a post from July 2008 where I quoted a report from the DPS that 62% of landlords were flouting the tenancy deposit rules
Then in October 2008 the DPS answered a number of questions which had been raised by people commenting on the blog
In January 2009, following on from various rumours, I was able to report that the DPS is open to to all landlords
In March 2009 I reported on still more complaints received about the DPS arbitration system and the fact that the complaints system cannot be used for the arbitration itself.
In May 2009 I reported on the problem of agents having run off with the deposit money and landlords being asked to refund the schemes after they had paid out the deposit money to tenants. I suggested that the Deposit Protection Service , where this cannot happen as the they hold the deposit money, may often be best after all
In July 2009 I reported on a new blog set up by Kevin Firth which you can visit here.
In September 2009, just over a year after the 62% failure post, I blogged that the figure had now gone down to 30% of landlords
In October I commented on a circular I had seen which suggested that in tenancy deposit arbitrations, more weight is given to the evidence of inventory clerks as landlords themselves are not considered independent
I also reported on a readers story telling how the DPS had failed to pay the deposit money to her after getting a CCJ in her favour because the court order did not mention them
I also reported on the sad case of a tenant in despair after the DPS had paid her deposit money to her landlord. This was because she had not sent her evidence to the arbitrator in time, because she had not received the letter telling her what to do
Then finally there is my interview of Kevin Firth in my Notable Propety Persons series.
I will be discussing with Kevin next week many of the issues raised about by these posts. But do YOU have any questions? What is your experience of dealing with the DPS. Please use the form on >> this page to let me know.
In my opinion the DPS is the most transparent deposit service of all 3 schemes. It gives a landlord & tenant complete piece of mind.
I haven’t had that many problems with the DPS and have never needed to use the ADR service mainly due to us having had good tenants & those that have been disputed have been settled diplomatically by both parties.
My main problem has been the single claim process as it can take a while before the deposit has been repaid although the latest change to the DPS website is you can now download the forms which is a better process.
Other problems have been with tenants loosing repayment ID codes which delays the repayment process during the course of a tenancy the tenant may change contact numbers or email addresses which they forget to update the DPS & loose there repayment ID has also caused delays.
The most recent problem I have had is where the lead tenant on a joint tenancy is no longer, due to a separation then the 2nd tenant takes over the tenancy but the lead tenant has all the ID & repayment ID and won’t pass it on to the joint tenant. This has caused problems as unless the DPS terms have changed very recently they will only communicate repayment ID details with the lead tenant.
All in all we have supported the DPS since 2008 when we first started trading & still believe it to a solid robust fair service, the easy to use website makes it very simple to protect a deposit quickly.
I would like to know Kevin’s views on the 10 day lapse in even successful payments.
If you are a landlord and your prospective new tenant tells you that they havent got the deposit yet because it is subject to adjudication this is going to set alarm bells ringing and also means the landlord has to take the tenant on trust or offer out to another tenant.
Also I remember reading that in the highest proprtion of cases the tenant wins because the landlrods dont understand the technicalities of their application for adjudication. Has this changed?
I recently attended a local county court user’s group meeting and the judges said the main problems they are seeing with tenants applying for redress for non protection is they fail to supply any evidence of it in the form of written confirmation from the schemes themselves. So if the tenants dont understand the process for apply for non protection and the landlords dont understand the requirements for successfully challenging on adjudication, that would also seem to be a major but hidden barrier
Thank you, those are both down on my list to ask Kevin next week.