Letting agents play an important role in ensuring the private rented sector is professional and well managed, and that the good-quality homes our communities need are available.
The letting agent Code of practice sets out how letting agents should carry out their work. It also requires them to join a register.
Code of practice
The Code of practice is a set of standards that letting agents in Scotland have to comply with. It sets out a number of requirements that letting agents should follow, including that they must be honest and transparent in their dealings with clients.
Letting agents should be open, accessible and honest; never provide false or misleading information and handle private information sensitively. They should also comply with all relevant legislation and not unlawfully discriminate against landlords, tenants or prospective landlords and tenants on the basis of age, disability, sex, gender reassignment, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy or maternity, race, religion or belief or sexual orientation.
From 31 January 2018, anyone carrying out letting agency work in Scotland will be required to register on the Scottish Government’s new Register of Letting Agents and complete training. The Scottish Government say that it is a criminal offence to carry out letting agency work without being registered and fines of up to PS50,000 and imprisonment for six months are possible.
Register of letting agents
If you are a landlord or letting agent in Scotland, you must be registered with the Scottish Landlord Register. You can do this online through the Scottish Landlord Register website or by contacting your local council housing department.
Everyone carrying out letting agency work in Scotland, including some social landlords, is now required to be registered and relevant staff must have met minimum training requirements. Registrations expire after three years and agents must submit renewal applications if they wish to continue to operate.
Letting agents who do not renew their registration before the deadline, or whose registration is refused or revoked by Scottish Ministers will be removed from the Register. You can find a list of agents who have been taken off the Register on the Register website.
It is a criminal offence for someone to carry out letting agency work without being on the Register. Anyone found guilty of this offence can be fined up to PS50,000 and could have their letting agency work banned.
Refusal or revocation of registration
In Scotland, all landlords of residential property must register with their local authority before they can let their property. The requirement to register helps councils to remove disreputable landlords from the market and protect tenants and the wider community from antisocial behaviour.
Section 21-13-8 states that a director of the Council may refuse or revoke registration where they believe that a letting agent has committed or been found guilty of an offence under the Act. This includes an offence relating to fraud, dishonesty, violence or drugs.
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A director of the Council can also refuse to renew a letting agent’s registration, and issue a show cause order. In this case, the letting agent must appear before the council at an administrative hearing and the case will be heard without any criminal prosecution.
From 31 January 2018, the Housing (Scotland) Act 2014 introduced a new mechanism for resolving disputes about letting agents. From then on, a tenant, landlord or Scottish ministers can apply to the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland Housing and Property Chamber for an enforcement order against a letting agent where they feel that they have failed to comply with the Letting Agent Code of Practice.
Enforcement orders
If your letting agent has failed to comply with the Code of Practice, you can apply for an enforcement order. This can be done if you think they've not followed the Code or you're unhappy with their response to your complaint.
This can include issues like failing to give you information in writing or giving you a reasonable time to respond. The Tribunal can decide that the letting agent has not complied with the Code and will issue an enforcement order to require them to take steps to rectify the breach.
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To be a registered letting agent, you need to meet training requirements and pass a fit and proper person test. Scottish Ministers can revoke or refuse an application for registration or remove an existing entry if the person isn't a fit and proper person.
Monitoring compliance by letting agents is done by a combination of inspections, investigations and other activities by the Scottish Ministers, local authorities, police Scotland and other public bodies. The inspectors or other agencies may work in partnership with letting agent membership bodies, landlords and tenants, housing rights organisations and voluntary redress schemes.
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