Can L deduct from deposit for damage caused by T?

[Planner]

Hi MarsMug,

Yes, plumber replaced ball valve which was causing tank to keep overfilling. So excess water was going down overflow pipe. Overflow pipe on outside of tank was leaking also.

If water stopcock had been turned off then tank wouldn't have been overfilling and overflow wouldn't have been leaking so there wouldn't have been damage caused or as much damage caused.

Surely this is six of one and half a dozen of the other?

If ball valve was working correctly and overflow pipe wasnt leaking then the tank wouldnt have been overfilling and overflow wouldnt have been leaking!

[David Lawrenson]

Water leak and insurance claim

In my view the tenant should have told you he was going away so you could have taken appropriate action to make sure property was safe from leaks and other eventualities. Normally within the TA there should be clause spelling this out.
As he failed to do this I would suggest the resulting damage can be taken from the deposit.
By all means you could try to claim the resulting increased insurance excess but I would think that this could be successfully disputed by the tenant if it went to a TDS tribunal, for example.
I just don't think they would accept that you could charge the tenant for this head of cost.
In my view, you should accept that the premium and excess could go up and simply put this down to the cost of doing business.
David Lawrenson

[Mars Mug]

I would expect that insurance claim cost of excess, including future premium increases, is significantly less that the damage cost, otherwise why claim. In that case if all the blame is with the tenant then surely they would be happier to cover the insurance costs rather than the repair costs?