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Reading the Inside Housing of 17th August, there seems to be a theme of landlords not understanding how the law actually applies to them. This is not uncommon. When I worked in housing and began managing a hostel, there were two tenants on assured tenancies and one on a secure tenancy. I was told to sign them up on assured shorthold tenancies, which I refused to do as I knew it was illegal. I then realised the managers in supported housing knew nothing about tenancy law; they went to a solicitor who backed me up on my refusal. But what if anyone else had been the manager? We would have had three illegal tenancies on our hands.

There were three articles in that magazine which caught my eye. The first was “Rule breaches may have excluded homeless people�, which is about people being excluded by staff who do not know how to operate their own policies – clearly a legal breach.

The second was “Councils may have to pay millions for repairs on flats�, which is about how a Council failed to follow the legal procedures for consultation and providing information under the law relating to leaseholders.

The third was “Landlords unaware of compulsory deposit rules�, which is a short article saying more than 30,000 landlords have failed to register with the Tenancy Deposit Scheme. The penalty for failure is the landlord can’t get possession of the property and has to pay three times the deposit in compensation.

What these all have in common is a failure to not only understand the law but the penalties imposed. I don’t believe it is arrogance – just ignorance, which can be very costly. It’s not just money, but the damage to your reputation, being the subject of these articles. It speaks to the need to keep all your staff skilled up and knowledgeable of changes in the law.