Landlord's agent not protected deposit & Agent now been struck off by Companies House

[mizzjulie]

My son took on a new tenancy a couple of years ago and paid a deposit to the Agent who provided him with signed paperwork informing him that the deposit would be protected with a deposit scheme.

He has now found out that the Agent has gone bust. Basically upon investigation, it appears that the Company has been struck off by Companies House, possibly for not filing any accounts since the Company was incorporated in 2015. It may be worth pointing out that his previous Company was closed down but i'm not sure about the reasons behind that.

My son pays his rent directly to the Landlord but he has found out that the Agent is still illegally trying to collect rents. We have heard that he owes some Landlords an excessive amount of rent that he has collected but not paid over to them.

Anyway, my main issue here is my son's deposit. He paid £720 in cash to the Agent and has signed paperwork to say it would be protected with a deposit scheme. He has telephoned the deposit scheme and they have no trace of the deposit having been protected.

What is my son's legal right here? Obviously if the Agent is responsible for this then he really has no where to go as the Director of the Letting Agents is a separate entity to the Limited Company. My son has been told that it's the Landlords responsibility.

Can anyone throw any light on this please?

[spiritdreams]

Landlord is responsible for the deposit, not the agent.

I would chase this up with landlord, if the deposit was not protected you have potential of getting a penalty payment of £720-£2160 from the landlord.

[theartfullodger]

If son has paid agent something then he does not owe landlord for it. Hopefully it was bank transfer not ccash-no-receipt?

As above, deal direct with landlord: The agent not protecting deposit may well work in son's favour.

[AndrewDod]

As above, it is not your problem. The landlord must refund the deposit even if he does not have it.

You could take it further and penalise the landlord (and he in turn could sue a nonexistent agent) - however, unless there is something else going on here that would be a pretty nasty thing to do - the landlord is almost certainly a lot more abused here than your son.

[mizzjulie]

This is a fact now... The Director has been going through a transformation to become a woman, he even set up the Company under his female name then there was a change of Director details back to the man. Something definitely weird going on with he/she and it would appear that he/she has used other peoples money to fund this transformation.

The information regarding the Company and all the change of details, etc is freely available on Companies House and I have seen first hand that the guy is transforming into a female!

[theartfullodger]

It's not a c+ck up then?

[mariner]

Son should pay rent direct to LL named on the LA asap.
Whilst son has a claim against LL for unprotected Deposit, given the circumstances described, I would hope Judge would not apply full Penalty against LL.