Accommodation provided by your employer as part of your work or training, or in a shelter or shelter managed by a public authority, a housing association, a voluntary organization or a charity is exempt from the right to rent check requirement. However, if you are not part of any of these groups, you must prove your right to rent. You can do this by combining several documents, such as letters from HM Prisons and probation services. At the front of this document is a complete list of documents that can be used to comply with a verification of the right to rent.If your documents aren't just a passport, you might want to find them in this online guide so you can show them to the landlord and review them more quickly.
The landlord must make a copy of all documents and keep them for at least 12 months after the end of the lease. If you have a limited-time rental right, the landlord must write new checks after a year or (if longer) just before your current period of leave or right to live in the UK expires. If the landlord then learns that you have no current permit or right to live in the UK, you should immediately inform the Home Office. This doesn't affect your tenancy or other rights to live in the home. Landlords and agents must not discriminate when enforcing these rules. There is a code of practice to help ensure that they don't.
This means that they must review everyone's documents, not just those of people who may appear to be migrants. If you think you have been discriminated against, you can find guidance on how to challenge it here. If landlords are found to have rented to someone who has no right to rent, they can be fined and possibly sent to prison. It is recommended that landlords use the verification service if they are not sure how this guide can be applied to potential tenants. This guide is vague, but it should mean that long-term residents (for example, people from Commonwealth countries) should find landlords more willing to accept them without the documents that others may need to provide. The law requires all landlords in England to prove their “right to rent” before leasing their property to a potential adult tenant.
If one of your tenants subleases the property, it's best to agree in writing who is responsible for paying the Right checks to Rent. If the prospective occupant has a limited-time rental right, the landlord or agent must perform the checks no earlier than 28 days before the start of the lease. If you've verified that your tenant has an unlimited right to rent, you'll have an ongoing legal excuse and you won't have to carry out any follow-up checks. If you plan to prove your right to rent by presenting the documents from lists A or B to the landlord, it is advisable to have the relevant documents ready before you start looking for a property. When a person has a limited-time rental right, the landlord will need to carry out a new check to find out if the person is still entitled to rent within 12 months or, if they have a residence permit or an immigration document that expires after 12 months, just before their permit or document expires. If they don't pass the follow-up check, it's your responsibility to tell the Home Office; otherwise, you could receive a fine or even a prison sentence of up to five years. The landlord could also defend himself if he took reasonable steps to terminate the lease after the eligibility period ended or after a notification from the Home Office that the person had no right to rent. People with an unlimited right to rent can have pre-lease checks performed at any time before the lease begins.
The landlord verification service will respond via email within 2 business days with either “yes” or “no” as an answer. Landlords cannot discriminate against those who choose to prove their right to rent using a document from the list of acceptable documents, as doing so is against the law. Landlords must prove the right to rent in a fair, justifiable and consistent manner regardless of whether they believe the tenant is British, a resident or a person with limited permission to reside in the United Kingdom. If you only have a non-digital CoA, you'll need to check it through the landlord verification service in order get a positive Right To Rent (PRRN) notification confirming your right to rent. Once you have received your participation code, you can check your tenant's right by following this link. In addition, if you have an indefinite residence permit with an expired passport, you can also use it as proof for your right to rent.
