The repayment process

When tenants start the deposit repayment process

If you’ve agreed with your Landlord or Letting Agent how much you should receive then you can log in to your account and start the process. This is how the process works.

1. The nominated tenant

If you live in a property with other tenants, one tenant will have to act on behalf of all the tenants. This is the nominated tenant. You should agree who this will be with the other tenants before starting the repayment process, as we'll ask you to confirm this, when starting the process.

If you're in a tenancy on your own, you won't need to confirm this.

2. Decide how deposit should be paid

You'll need to tell us how you want the deposit to be split between you and the landlord, and provide your bank details. If there are other tenants in your property, you'll also need to provide their bank details and the amount you want to be repaid to each tenant.

If you’ve agreed to pay some of the deposit to your landlord or letting agent, for example if there's damage to the property, or other problems, you'll need to provide an amount and a reason for each deduction. 

3. Submit your repayment request

Once you're happy with your repayment request, we'll ask you to review and submit it. At this point we’ll email your landlord or letting agent asking them to review your request. 

4. Your landlord or letting agent will review your request

Your landlord or letting agent will receive an email with a link to log in and review your repayment request.

If they are happy with your repayment request, they’ll confirm this and we'll repay the deposit as you've instructed.

If your landlord or letting agent disagrees with your repayment request, they must start a new claim for deposit deductions. We'll close your repayment request and email you to log in and respond to their claim.

When your landlord or letting agent starts the deposit repayment process

This process applies when your landlord starts the repayment process, or if they reject your repayment request and start a new claim.

Your landlord (or letting agent) decides how your deposit should be paid

We'll email you to tell you that your landlord or letting agent has started the repayment process. If you live in a property with other tenants, one tenant will have to act on behalf of all the tenants. This is the nominated tenant. You should agree who this will be with the other tenants, as we'll ask you to confirm this.

You will be asked to review your landlord or letting agent's claim

If your landlord or letting agent has decided to return the full deposit to you

• We'll ask you to log in to confirm the repayment
• You’ll need to provide bank details you want us to use to repay the deposit. If you're acting as nominated tenant, you'll need to provide these for each tenant, as well as how much should be paid to each of them.
• Once you've provided these details, we'll repay the deposit as instructed and mark the deposit as closed on our system.

If your landlord or letting agent is claiming some or all of the deposit 

• To make a claim, your landlord or letting agent will need to provide the amount for each deduction they're claiming and the reasons why. We'll email you, asking you to review their claim and confirm if you agree or disagree with each deduction they've claimed for. If you disagree, or want to pay a different amount, you'll need to provide reasons why. We'll also ask you to provide bank details for yourself and, if you're the nominated tenant, those of the other tenants in the property.
• We'll also ask you to confirm if you’d like to use our Dispute Resolution Service if your landlord or letting agent disagrees with your response. It’s free to use and avoids the need for court action.

Find out more about dispute resolution

Your landlord or letting agent will review your response to their claims

We'll contact your landlord or letting agent asking them to log in and review your response.

If they're happy with your response to their claim, they’ll confirm this and we'll repay the deposit as instructed. We'll then mark the deposit as closed in our system.

If they aren't happy with your response to their claim, we'll ask them if they’d like to use our Dispute Resolution Service. Once they've confirmed this, we'll email you asking you to submit evidence to support your position to a dispute adjudicator.