Before you start
Did my landlord commit an offence?
There are a range of offences for Rent Repayment Orders (RROs). The overwhelming majority of RRO applications are for failure to license. If you suspect a licensing offence then check first with the council for the rental property. For illegal eviction and other offences, please see the table below.
Four out of five applications are about licensing, and the council holds the answer. Ask its private sector housing team, in writing, about your old address:
- Was the property licensed between your dates, and under which scheme?
- If a licence was granted, when was the application duly made — the date a complete application and the fee actually reached the council?
- Was the address in a selective or additional licensing area during those dates, and was there any gap between schemes?
- Has any civil penalty been issued against this landlord, for what offence, and has the appeal period expired?
It costs nothing and you’re entitled to ask. Step 3 has the wording, and what to do if the council refuses on data protection grounds.
Why the duly made date, and not the register
Councils publish licence registers, and they are often out of date. A register entry isn’t what ends a licensing offence — and neither is the grant of the licence. What ends it is the date a duly made application reached the council: complete, with the fee and whatever documents that council requires.
That date decides two things at once: how many months of rent are in your claim, and the day your deadline to apply falls. So it’s worth getting in writing rather than guessing from a register.
If your old address was in London, our register of London licensing designations lists the additional and selective schemes we have found, borough by borough, with their start and end dates. Mandatory HMO licensing isn’t in it, because it is national and applies everywhere in England without a designation — so a borough with no entry is a borough with no additional or selective scheme, not one where no licence was needed.
It is a dated snapshot compiled on 9 September 2026, not a live record: some end dates are calculated from the five-year statutory maximum rather than confirmed, and those are marked “Implied” with a question mark against the status. Use it to see whether a scheme plausibly covered your dates — then confirm with the council, which is the only source that can tell you whether your property was licensed.
Landlords often send in an application without the fee or the obligatory documents. That may not count as duly made, which means the offence carried on. It’s one of the most common places a claim turns out to be worth far more than the tenant expected.
The two questions behind most claims
A licensing offence is simply this: the property needed a licence, and there wasn’t one. Both halves have to be true.
1. Did it need a licence?
Three schemes, all of equal weight. Mandatory catches houses with five or more occupants in two or more households sharing an amenity, anywhere in England — but not a purpose-built flat in a block of three or more. Additional and selective are made borough by borough: additional catches smaller shared houses, selective catches every private let in the designated area, even a single-occupancy studio.
2. Was there one?
Only the council can tell you, and only for your dates. Schemes are designated for a maximum of five years, so an area can be licensable one month and not the next — and where a scheme ended before its replacement began, nothing was licensable in the gap. Ask about the dates you lived there, not about today.
The ten offences, and what decides each
These are the offences in the table at section 40(3) of the Housing and Planning Act 2016. You can apply on one ground or several, but you get one award however many you prove (Ficcara v James [2021] UKUT 38 (LC)) — a second offence strengthens the case, it doesn’t double the money.
Licensing — rows 5 and 6
- Letting an unlicensed HMO — section 72(1), Housing Act 2004 What decides it: whether the property was licensable on your dates, and whether a licence was in force or an application duly made. Where the answer comes from: the council, in writing. Your own evidence of how many people lived there and how the house was shared.
- Letting an unlicensed house in a selective area — section 95(1), Housing Act 2004 What decides it: whether the address fell inside a selective designation on your dates. Occupancy is irrelevant — a studio counts. Where the answer comes from: the council. Ask about scheme boundaries and gaps between schemes, not just about the licence.
Eviction and harassment — rows 1 and 2
- Illegal eviction — section 1(2) or 1(3), Protection from Eviction
Act 1977
What decides it: whether you were put out without a court order and a
bailiff — changed locks, removed belongings, refused entry.
Where the answer comes from: you. Messages, photographs, a crime reference number, a
council tenancy relations officer’s file, a neighbour.
If you left the property at the landlord’s request, without a court order, then this will not be counted as illegal eviction and no RRO will be made on that ground. But see below on the tenancy-reform offences — since 1 May 2026 a landlord who used a possession ground they knew did not apply, or who re-let or marketed the property after using the moving-in or selling ground, commits an offence even though you left of your own accord. - Harassment — section 1(3A), Protection from Eviction Act 1977
What decides it: conduct likely to make you give up the property
— entering without notice, cutting off services, threats, relentless pressure.
Where the answer comes from: a contemporaneous record. Keep every message; write down
dates while you remember them.
It is very difficult to win an RRO on the basis of harassment ONLY. We strongly advise against this. - Violence to secure entry — section 6(1), Criminal Law Act 1977 What decides it: force used to get in while someone was there opposing it. Rare, and usually pleaded alongside eviction. Where the answer comes from: police records, photographs of damage, witnesses.
The tenancy-reform offences — rows 2A, 2B and 2C, from 1 May 2026
- Misusing a possession ground — section 16J(1), Housing Act 1988 What decides it: whether the landlord knew, or was reckless as to whether, the ground didn’t apply when the notice was served. Where the answer comes from: the notice itself, and what happened afterwards.
- Letting or marketing after using the moving-in or selling ground — section 16J(2), Housing Act 1988 What decides it: whether the property was re-let or advertised inside the restricted period after you were made to leave. Where the answer comes from: portal listings, agent windows, the electoral roll, a screenshot with a date on it. Look, and look soon.
- Continuing breaches — section 16J(3), Housing Act 1988 What decides it: whether the breach carried on after it was identified. Where the answer comes from: the same places, over a longer period.
The full offence table, with the row numbers — worth reading if you have seen these described elsewhere as rows 8, 9 and 10, which is wrong.
Council notices and banning orders — rows 3, 4 and 7
- Ignoring an improvement notice — section 30(1), Housing Act 2004 What decides it: whether the council served one and the deadline in it passed without the work being done. Only rent paid after that deadline counts, which is why reporting disrepair early matters. Where the answer comes from: the council’s environmental health file.
- Ignoring a prohibition order — section 32(1), Housing Act 2004 What decides it: whether the property was let, or occupied, in breach of an order restricting its use. Where the answer comes from: the council.
- Breaching a banning order — section 21, Housing and Planning Act 2016 What decides it: whether the landlord was banned and let anyway. Where the answer comes from: the rogue landlord database, through the council.
Rows 8 to 10 of the table are reserved for the landlord redress scheme and the private rented sector database. Neither is in force, so neither can found an application yet.
Signs worth following up
None of these proves anything on its own. All of them are reasons to send the council that email.
- Five or more of you lived there, from more than one household, sharing a kitchen or bathroom.
- You never saw a licence, and the landlord never mentioned one.
- The landlord was cagey about the council, or asked you to say you were family or a lodger.
- You were asked to sign a licence agreement rather than a tenancy, or told you were a guardian or a lodger when nobody else lived there.
- Rooms were added, a lounge became a bedroom, or the number of people crept up.
- Rent was cash only, or there was no written agreement.
- You reported disrepair and the council came out.
- You were pushed out quickly, or the property was back on the market within months.
Still not sure? That’s normal
Working out whether there was an offence is the part we’re most often asked about, and it’s the part where a wrong guess costs the most — in both directions. People who assume they have no claim usually turn out to be the ones who did.
Send us what you know. Advice is free, whether or not we end up acting for you, and we would much rather look at a doubtful case than have you drop it.
Don’t sit tight in an unlicensed property waiting for a better moment. An unlicensed house has usually never been inspected, and unlicensed properties are where the serious hazards are found. An application almost always forces the landlord to apply for a licence, which brings the council in and gets the property checked.
If you’re worried about your immediate safety, contact your council’s private sector housing team now, without waiting for anything on this site.