Question reference: S5W-24610
- Asked by: Andy Wightman, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
- Date lodged: 2 August 2019
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Current status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 21 August 2019
Question
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to address the findings in the paper, Review of Tenancy Deposit Schemes in Scotland, that nearly half of landlords did not know about letting agent registration or the letting agent code of practices, and that over 60% did not know about the First-Tier Tribunal for Scotland.
Answer
The Scottish Government will continue to work with the tenancy deposit schemes and other key stakeholders such as local authorities to raise awareness of matters affecting private landlords, including on letting agent regulation. This will supplement the landlord specific guide on letting agent regulation that has already been published.
Information on the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland is widely available. In addition the Easy Read Notes that must accompany every private residential tenancy include wide-ranging information about the First-Tier Tribunal for Scotland. As private residential tenancies increase in number and tenancies from the old tenancy regime diminish awareness amongst landlords and tenants is expected to improve significantly.
The First-tier Tribunal has recently reported in its annual report 2018-19 that 353 applications were received over the last year for an order for payment of a sanction where the landlord has failed to comply with the duty to pay a tenancy deposit into an approved scheme. It also reports a dramatic increase in access to justice since the dispute resolution for deposit protection cases transferred from the sheriff court.