For disputing my ex landlords claim on our deposit?

Well done for standing your ground and asserting your (legal, entirely reasonable) rights. In years of renting I've been stunned by what letting agents/landlords have tried to pull - and often they haven't tried very hard.

Mine wanted me to pay rent for two weeks without living in the flat while they refurbished the bathroom and didn't provide any accommodation, and asked for £200 off the deposit, literally all I did was dispute it and they gave up because they couldn't be bothered to make up a lie.

If you've been in the property a set number of years, them needing to touch up the paint and even recarpet is wear and tear. A lot of landlords forget that this kind of stuff is what rent has been paid for over the years - you've already paid for the wear and tear, they can't charge you again. Give 'em hell, OP.

As an ex landlord myself, how does this ever make any business sense? I could always relet my properties within days. It was never worth getting into a deposit dispute if I could get in, clean and redecorate and miss out on minimal rent.

A few years ago, I faced a similar situation. I attempted to compromise and agreed to give the landlord half of the deposit, even though I disagreed with it. Unknowingly, this action automatically released half the deposit to the landlord while the other half was still being disputed. Ultimately, the landlord's claim was unfounded, and I recovered my deposit. My advice is to avoid any compromises and dispute through the deposit scheme! Good luck!!

My aunty rents out a number of properties and one tenant in particular is a total nightmare. She complains about issues, my aunt arranges someone to come and look at it at an agreed time - and invariably there is some reason why she won't let them in! In the end my aunt decided to sell up - this tenant even harassed her on the day of my uncle's funeral but now the tenant has put in a complaint about her. I'm not sure of the ins and outs but the house is in limbo until the dispute is sorted out.

Some landlords will try anything to keep your deposit. We had one who took it as an "administration charge to cover check out expenses". When we queried this, he said that he had charged us for the check out inspection and for the time that it was empty while they re let it, because they hadn't managed to re let it while we were living there.
A fortnight before we were due to move out, he rang us and said that he wanted us out immediately so that he could show people round the flat. We were away that weekend, and even if we weren't, asking us to pack up and move within a day, and find somewhere to store our stuff was utterly unreasonable. He later claimed that it was our fault that the house was empty for 6 weeks, and sent us a bill for the additional 2 weeks rent!
Small claims court agreed with us, and we got our deposit back, and ignored the bill for the extra time.This was before the days of deposit protection schemes ,- at least now landlords can't pull stunts like that.

@aodirjjd
The deposit protection scheme was invented and made a legal requirement in part because some unscrupulous LLs viewed the deposit in effect as an extra months rent.
But that is not the whole story.
It was set up in part to create jobs. The scheme is entirely self funded.
But perhaps most importantly, it was set up, along with a host of other measures, as part of the government's war on landlords. The aim was to make life increasingly difficult for LLs so that they would exit the market. As has been mentioned in this thread, the deposit schemes are firmly on the side of the tenant.
If LLs selling up results in more property being made available for people to buy, then that could be viewed as a positive, but my flat for instance is in a city where much of the population looking for accommodation is fairly transient. The type of tenants I have are not looking to buy. They want decent accommodation for a couple of years and then they generally move on and away from the area, city and sometimes country. I don't see how me selling up to a non landlord is going to benefit people especially when you consider how many people apply to rent it when it goes on the market. But that is exactly what I am going to do in a couple of years.
I think the scheme is in principal a good idea but the way it's administered is often unfair and deliberately so.

This👆

'So many' doesn't mean all, does it?
The police were invented because so many people committed crimes.
Most of us still don't, though.

For all those “not all landlords” why do you think deposit protection scheme was invented and made a legal requirement? Because so many were dicks about the deposit!

Not this one, thank you.

and of course all landlords are bustards and all tenants are angelic. 🤔

I have several properties and I've only kept some £ twice. £100 once, when the tenants had damaged a curtain rail and taken down a shed, and another time I kept it all when the tenant had totally destroyed my house. It needed a new kitchen, they'd stolen the fireplace and left ALL their stuff in that I had to pay for removal of. They'd also not paid their rent for 5 months.

OP yanbu.

We once had a landlord try to keep money back from the deposit because "the oven glass had streaks on it from cleaning fluid".
We had photos of the oven before we moved in. And other than some "streaks on the glass" it was much much cleaner! It was absolutely filthy when we moved in. We sent the official before photos and they didn't even bother replying. Just released the whole deposit.

@Tomatina Cleaning is different to damage. If a LL tried to claim for a tiny scratch on a skirting board, then this is of course ridiculous, unfair and will be dismissed by the deposit company.
It would be classed as wear and tear and something so minor should not even be raised by a LL. But my point still stands that it has nothing to do with cleaning.
Cleaning is a tenant's responsibility. As a tenant you should leave the flat in the same state of cleanliness as you found it. That works both ways so if you found it dirty, leave it dirty. Wear and tear has nothing to do with cleaning and LLs should of course expect wear and tear.

An no, I don't know that it's a minority of tenants that fail to treat a property, which is indeed their home while they are renting it, with respect. I know quite a different story to that.

You certainly don't sound like the worst kind of tenant but I still wouldn't want you. I don't want tenants to pay for minor repairs themselves rather than bother the landlord every time. It is my job to be 'bothered'.
And I would want a tenant to 'improve' the property, not at least without discussing it with me first. If it was truly an improvement, then I would be happy to pay but if it was personal taste, then I'd want to be asked in advance and I wouldn't want to pay.
And I wouldn't want a tenant who doesn't understand their cleaning responsibilities and just assumes that a LL is going to screw them over because, as you must know, some (a minority?) of LLs do.

If it's been professionally cleaned for you, then you leave it professionally cleaned

Like the Spartans once (before being invaded, but pff, details) said: if.

@BruFord Yes, you're right, if it is in the original tenancy contract then the tenant would have to do it.

@Tomatina Sonetines having a deep clean is written into the lease. My friend’s lease specifically stated that the property was deep cleaned (she received a copy of the invoice) before she moved in and that she was expected to do the same at the end of her tenancy. . She did, and the landlord didn’t take a penny from her deposit.

"sorry @Tomatina you sound like exactly the kind of tenant I don't want. "

Really? The kind of tenants who:

*Pay the rent on time, in full, for years, no exceptions.
*Are considerate to neighbours, never play loud music or make any kind of disturbance.
*Keep the property clean and tidy, including outside areas.
*Pay for minor repairs ourselves rather than bother the landlord every time.
*Improve the property by replacing window blinds and redecorating front room (work carried out by professionals and paid for by us, colour scheme same as original).

Those kind of tenants.

I accept that there a minority of tenants exist who do cause structural damage and sometimes even trash the property and live in squalor. But this is a minority, as you must know.

What really infuriates me is the way landlords and their agents treat responsible, conscientious tenants as if they were the bad sort, and then try to squeeze every last penny out of them when they leave by inventing petty 'damage' (ie normal wear and tear) in order to keep the tenants' deposits.

When a tenant is living in a property, it is their home, and you cannot expect a house or flat to look like a show-home after years of normal family life.

As for deep cleaning - I know a couple of people who got their houses deep cleaned at the end of the tenancy, and guess what? The landlord/agent still rooted around and found tiny bits of 'damage' (such as a tiny scratch on a skirting board) and attempted to keep their deposits (without success). So the deep clean is pointless. Also any responsible landlord hoping to rent again will always get the property professionally cleaned after a tenancy, so expecting the tenant to do it just means the job is done twice. As I said, the tenant's responsibility is simply to leave the place clean, tidy, in reasonable repair, empty of possessions and with no structural damage. Expecting the property to look exactly the same as when they moved in is ridiculous.

Assuming your description here is genuine and accurate, and the carpets and walls aren’t badly damaged, just 3 years of wear, then yes they’re being unreasonable - but don’t panic, as TDS are brilliant and will sort this for you.

You should have got a deep clean done before you left though, that’s pretty standard and they shouldn’t be finding dust everywhere.

They get trashed every time. But thanks for the assumption! Believe me i wish I didn’t have to replace the carpet every time.

Back in the day, I had landlords successfully withhold my deposit for this kind of shit and less. Since the DPS, I have only had one landlord successfully make an unfair claim, which was only successful because we only lived there 6 months and she made out that the property was in better condition than it actually was when we moved in. (She was able to get a whole new carpet fitted at our expense.) What I'm saying is - the longer you have lived there, the better your case.

Landlords are forever using tenants' cash for betterment, whenever they can get away with it. YANBU and definitely push the dispute all the way to the end. It doesn't even take long, I don't think. (I own now and haven't used it in a while)

Good luck, OP!

Go straight to TDS. I'm a LL and it makes me furious that because there are scum LL's like this out there all LL get a bad name. A bit of dust should not warrant you paying for a deep clean either. Just make a copy of the EA report before you send it to TDS just in case it gets lost. You will win.

@Magentaplasticglasses as a landlord I find this absolutely ridiculous!!! carpets are always fair wear and tear and do not last a lifetime. landlord should expect to replace them every 3 to 5 years. radiator covers are obviously just needing fixed on properly and in fact do not even need to be there at all. I would not bother about them. i dont charge for repainting or cleaning because they are all maintenance and vat free. I actually do not even take a deposit because I feel that it is too much to expect a new tenant to come up with a months rent in advance as well as a deposit which is normally equivalent to another months rent. not feasible or fair. fight this all the way and if necessary take this to the ombudsman regarding repayment of deposit.

Yes, the only item I think you should be paying for is a deep clean.

My friend moved out of a property last year and it was in her contract that it had to be deep cleaned-but she organized her own cleaner and paid about £80 (small one-bedroom), I think.

Stick by your guns, some landlords take the piss, I know by experience. My last rental was spotless when we left. We repainted some of the walls and I spent HOURS cleaning the oven, it was spotless. The estate agent looked round and said it didn’t look like it had been lived in, and yet the landlady (lady of the manor, tight-fisted and owned nearly all the properties in the village) said she had to pay a professional oven cleaner to clean it - bollocks. In the end we forfeited £100 of the deposit just to pacify her but I often wish we hadn’t out of principle. She was well known for this, the old sod would sometimes be found walking around our property ‘just checking’.

Can't seem to edit my previous reply, it's the DPS insured scheme I used. £27

That's incorrect, you have to go via a TDS legally of course & it's more hoops, but I have the deposit