The Council’s goal is to improve the quality and choice of housing in the city and provide safe and healthy accommodation in the private rented sector.  

Its policy for enforcing standards in the PRS provides a staged approach to enforcement and one of the most serious consequences of repeatedly breaching housing law and renting unsafe housing is a banning order. Banning orders prohibit a person from letting, or managing residential accommodation in England and as a consequence of such an order the Council will consider their fit and proper status as a HMO licence holder.   

Coventry City Council has recently been successful in obtaining a banning order against a landlord who had a flagrant disregard for housing legislation and took a reactive approach to compliance. 

The landlord, who managed a number of HMOs in the city failed to be proactive in his complying with his duties under the Management of House in Multiple Occupation (England) Regulations and as such was prosecuted for not complying with Regulation 4.  

This is not the first time the Council sought a prosecution and in line with its enforcement policy pursued a banning order to prevent this landlord from operating in Coventry.  

The first tier tribunal decided to grant a banning order for 15 months. This is a first case of this nature in Coventry and sends out a strong message for all landlords who are not complying with their duties and taking a proactive approach to the management of HMOs. 

The Housing Enforcement team at Coventry City Council has had some recent changes and as such they have a new structure. 

Inside the team there is now: Principle Environmental Health Officer, three Environmental Health Officers, an Enforcement Intelligence Officer, a Principal Environmental Health Officer and an Empty Dwellings Officer (currently in the process of recruiting). 

The team still sits within the Property Licensing and Housing Enforcement team and our role is to undertake inspections of single occupancy properties in response to housing disrepair claims made from or on behalf of tenants. 

We will also be undertaking inspections pro-actively, this means that we will be visiting properties where no complaint has been made but we have information that suggests that the property may have defects that may need to be addressed.  

There are new regulations which have come into force and so those will be included in both our reactive and proactive inspections going forward.  

We are continuing enforcing the Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) after the end of the project mentioned in a previous newsletter. This places a requirement on all landlords of privately rented properties to ensure that their properties reach at least an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of E before they let it to a tenant unless they have registered a relevant exemption. View landlord guidance.

Rogue landlords database 

We will also be looking to be more proactive in recording landlords on the database where appropriate. View guidance on the database.

The Empty Dwellings Officer will be working with other Council departments to implement our Empty Dwellings Policy to bring any empty dwellings within the city back into use for future generations. 

Before we can issue your HMO licence, we are required by law to send a draft copy of the licence to any person or entity with a financial or legal interest in the property, and to give them a period of time to make any representations. Unfortunately, some landlords are not reading the documents that we send them and are then realising that they are unhappy with the length of licence they have been granted, or some of the licence conditions once the final licence is issued.    

While we understand that the documents we send you are substantial, and that you have more enjoyable things you could be doing than reading them, we want to make sure you have the opportunity to have your say and to correct any errors before the terms of the licence become legally binding. We therefore thought it would be useful to make a brief guide to the documents you receive when we send you a draft licence.  

The draft will be sent by post to the address you have provided on your application – so remember to tell us if your address changes! It will comprise the following items:  

Covering letter – this gives general information about the documents we’re sending you.  If you are the proposed licence holder, it will also tell you how to pay the Stage 2 licence fee.  

Notice of Intention to Grant – this gives specific details of licence, including the name of the proposed licence holder; the maximum occupancy of the property; and the length of the licence period. It will also give you the deadline to make representations, which will be 21 days from the date of the notice.  

Draft licence: Front Page – this shows the information that will need to be displayed in the property when the final licence is issued. It includes the name and address of the licence holder; the name and address of the manager, if there is one; the maximum persons and households permitted by the licence; and the length and start and dates of the licence period. You should make sure that these details are all correct.  

Draft licence: Schedules 1 & 2B – these are the standard conditions that apply to all HMOs in Coventry. Schedule 1, Condition 1 shows the maximum number of people that are allowed to live in each bedroom – these numbers are based on the space standards set out in national legislation, and so it is not uncommon for these numbers to be greater than the maximum persons allowed by the licence. However, you may still not have more persons living in the property than specified on the front page of the licence.  

Draft licence: Schedule 2B – this section sets out specific conditions for this property only. These conditions will be different on each licence, so you should always make sure that you read and understand them. These conditions will usually require you to undertake works in the property and will be informed by the inspection we carry out as part of the licensing process. For example, if we believe that one of the rooms needs a fire door, we will add a condition requiring you to fit one.  

Each condition will have a deadline for compliance – this will often be three months from the date of the licence. These deadlines will look at the date that the final licence is issued, not the date of the draft licence.  

If we are not able to make the changes that you want, we will inform you of this by e-mail if the changes are minor. If you make substantial representations that we are not able to uphold, we will include a letter detailing why along with your full licence.  

Once the full licence has been issued the conditions become legally binding, and the only way to amend them is to either apply to us to vary the licence, or appeal to the first-tier residential property tribunal. Both of these options represent more work, and possibly more expense, for you than simply e-mailing us within the representations period, so it really is in your best interests to read the draft licence thoroughly as soon as you receive it, and e-mail us promptly if you do have any representations to make.

When we issue your draft HMO licence, the licence holder’s copy of the pack will request payment of the Stage 2 fee and will give instructions on how to do this. We ask that you pay online, or that you pay over the phone with a credit or debit card. 

Recently, several landlords have tried to pay their Stage 2 fees by bank transfer to the Council. Unfortunately, when you pay in this way the money goes into a generic bank account, and there is often no way for our Finance team to know which department the money is for. Consequently, we are not made aware that the fee has been paid and may continue to chase for it or even revoke your licence.   

If there are extenuating circumstances why you cannot pay online or over the phone, please contact us at hmo@coventry.gov.uk, and we will discuss possible alternative options.   

We have recently been receiving a lot of queries with individuals struggling to search the public register for properties. When in the public register you can press the following buttons on your keyboard: Ctrl + F. This will open a search box; you can then type in the property address that you are looking for and filter through the register. 

We are still working on implementing a new licensing software, which will include an improved version of the public register. We will announce when the new system goes live in due course.

We have begun auditing the Coventry Landlord Accreditation Scheme and have identified a few key points which we wanted to remind all agents/landlords. Being CLAS accredited means that you will adopt the Code of Conduct for all properties that you manage. When auditing your accreditation, we will be requesting that you provide details for your entire portfolio not just the HMO’s. This should be noted that all information provided as part of the CLAS application form/audit will be processed in line with Coventry City Council’s Privacy Policy and will not be shared with third parties. 

More details regarding CLAS audit can be found on our web pages.