Here is a question to the blog clinic from John (not his real name) who is a landlord.
My tenant left without paying the final rent. What options do I have to recover the money the tenant owes to me? Grateful for your advice
Answer
This is not uncommon and I think the usual way of dealing with it is to take the money from the deposit. This should be possible provided your tenancy agreement contains suitable clauses regarding the landlords right to deduct for rent arrears.
If there is no deposit, or if all the deposit has been used up to pay for damage to the property, then you have a problem.
The only legal way to recover the money, assuming the tenant fails to pay, is to bring proceedings for a County Court Judgement (CCJ).
There are two problems with this:
- Often tenants move out leaving no forwarding address – and to bring legal proceedings you need to have an address where the paperwork can be served, and
- Tenants often do not have enough money anyway to pay the judgement debt, And you cannot get blood out of a stone.
Unfortunately, the court procedures to enforce payment of a CCJ are not particularly good. I take a look at them in this blog post here – they have not changed much since it was written.
Your best chance of getting some sort of payment is if the tenant has a job. You can then apply for an attachment of earnings order (once you have the CCJ).
You may also be able to apply to the court for the paperwork to be served on the tenant at her employers which would get around the problem of having no address. However, this will need a separate application to the court for leave.
Mind you, the monthly payments under an attachment of earnings order are not normally very high and many landlords decide that it is not worth the bother.
Although you will sometimes find that the tenant will pay up to prevent a CCJ being made in the first place as it will affect their credit rating. If you are lucky.
The only real solution to this problem is to try to choose a tenant who is unlikely to do this in the first place. But it is easy to be wise after the event.
“Often tenants move out leaving no forwarding address – and to bring legal proceedings you need to have an address where the paperwork can be served”
In the past, I’ve successfully served paperwork at the last known address. i.e the rental property.
You may have issues though if the tenants later apply to have judgement set aside on the basis that the paperwork was not served on them. Has that ever happened to you?
I’ve been on the receiving end of it twice but over 15 years ago so things may have changed.
The first time I was working for the government abroad and the claimant served notice at the rental property instead of the correspondence address which they held. The tenants had thrown it in the bin. By the time I found out about it, it was over 30 days and the entry had been made on the CCJ register.
I contacted the (helpful) register trust who said it couldn’t be removed. I sought legal advice from a high street solicitor who said the best result would be having it marked ‘satisfied’. As this would affect my ability to finance, I paid a large, reputable law firm and spoke to an expensive senior partner who told me it could only be set aside if the debt wasn’t properly owed (it was). It showed on the register for 6 years, albeit ‘satisfied’.
The other occasion was with a rogue freeholder, inventing charges which I disputed. He served legal paperwork at the communal area of the flats knowing full well I didn’t live there. I discovered the paperwork by accident on a routine visit. At court, I brought up about the incorrect service. The judge said I should have re-directed my mail with Royal Mail. I pointed out I had never lived there and the paperwork had been served by hand anyway. The judge said that the service was irrelevant. (I won incidentally and the freeholder disappeared owing costs).
I have subsequently served paperwork on tenants at the last known rental address without issue.
I accept it may be theoretically possible for a tenant to have it set aside but it would be very difficult for them in practice. Not least of which would be getting free legal representation for doing an anonymous runner with the last month’s rent.
I’d check CPR before relying on this but this is my understanding;
https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/howtosetasideacountycourtjudgment/settingasideaccj.aspx
Court papers
If you did not get the court papers through the post, the court will not always agree that this is a good reason to set aside the judgment. The court is allowed to send the papers to your usual or last-known address (even if you have moved), unless the creditor has reason to believe that you have moved. If you have moved and have given your creditors your new address, then you should be contacted there.
If you have moved and there are reasons why your creditor should be aware of this, they should take reasonable steps to try to find your current address. If they are not able to find your current address, they should consider whether there is any other way of sending the claim form to you. If no suitable alternative is available, they can send the papers to your old address even though they know that you do not live there anymore.
If it is served by post to the rental address, then it seems reasonable that it should be deemed properly served as the tenant could/should have arranged for redirection of post.