Deposit Protection, and How People Lose Theirs
The scheme rules are simple. Most disputes are lost on evidence rather than on the merits.
What the landlord must do
Protect the deposit in one of the approved schemes within thirty days of receiving it, and give you the prescribed information: which scheme, how to get the money back, and how disputes are handled. Both parts are required. Protecting the money but never sending the paperwork is still a breach.
The rules and the three schemes are set out plainly at gov.uk. It is worth ten minutes of reading before you sign anything.
Why most disputes turn on evidence
Adjudicators do not visit the property. They read what both sides submit and decide on the balance of it. A landlord with a dated inventory, signed at check-in, with photographs, will usually beat a tenant who says the mark was already there.
The reverse is equally true and less well known. A landlord with no check-in inventory has very little to argue with, and adjudicators are consistent about that.
Fair wear and tear
The phrase does a lot of work and is worth understanding. Carpets flatten, paint scuffs, seals discolour. A landlord cannot charge you to return a five-year-old carpet to new condition, because it would not have been new by then regardless of who lived there.
What is not wear and tear: burns, pet damage, anything screwed into a wall without permission, and a property returned unclean when it was let clean.
