Landlord Responsibilities: Bills, Maintenance and Repairs

As a landlord, knowing all your responsibilities is crucial to avoid getting into any awkward and tricky situations further down the road. Newbie and experienced landlords alike have plenty of queries surrounding what is and isn’t their responsibility.

To ensure you aren’t caught out and can provide your tenants with a satisfying rental experience, we’ve provided a summary of all the responsibilities a landlord has when it comes to utility bills and property maintenance. We’ve delved into numerous circumstances, including paying for bills, reporting repairs, structural work and keeping a property safe. These responsibilities are set out in law by the Landlord and Tenant Act.

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The Main Landlord Responsibilities

Below, we’ve listed a summary of a landlord’s main and most important responsibilities. Many of these responsibilities can be listed in the tenancy agreement that all tenants should be provided before their tenancy begins.

• Ensure that the property is habitable and safe to live in
• Provide locks and keys that are fully functional
• Regularly check gas and electrical appliances and obtain the necessary safety certificates for each
• Provide new tenants with an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC)
• Ensure that all fire safety regulations are carefully followed
• All provided furniture and furnishings should be fire safe
• Perform any necessary repairs to the property (including ones reporting by tenants)
• Protect the deposits of your tenants through a deposit protection scheme. This deposit needs to be quickly returned when the tenancy ends 
• Pay all required bills

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Repairs and Maintenance

Landlord Responsibilities

Knowing exactly which repair and maintenance work is the landlord’s role can save you heaps of time and confusion in the future. According to the Landlord and Tenant Act, the following tasks are all the landlord’s responsibility:

• To keep in repair the structure and exterior, including drains gutters and external pipes
• To keep in repair and proper working order the installations for the supply of water, gas, electricity and for sanitation (including basins, sinks, baths and sanitary conveniences), but not other fixtures, fittings and appliances for making use of the supply of water, gas or electricity
• To keep in repair and proper working order the installation for space heating and heating water

Similarly, landlords are also responsible for any structural repairs, including:

• Any exterior parts of the building
• Roof
• Chimney
• Heating and hot water
• Bathroom fittings
• Pipes (for the boiler and gas)
• Electrical wiring
• Either repairing or replacing any faulty appliances that were supplied by the landlord (such as an oven or washing machine)

Landlords aren’t responsible for any broken items or structural damage which is caused by tenants acting irresponsibly and generally not following the rules of their tenancy agreement. One of the most common examples of this is broken doors/windows. When this damage is caused by the tenant, it isn’t the landlord’s job to replace or repair them.

Tenant Responsibilities

Because the tenant is the one living in the property on a day-to-day basis, they’re responsible for keeping the home at an acceptable standard of living and taking care of any general maintenance throughout the home.

Here’s a list of other tenant responsibilities:

• Keeping the property clean and hygienic throughout
• Using utilities responsibly and limiting use where possible. This can be done by turning off appliances when not in use, only having taps running when they’re needed and so on
• Taking care of small general maintenance tasks like replacing lightbulbs
• Avoiding any property damage. If any damage to the property or its contents happens, then repairs/replacements can be taken off the tenant’s deposit (more on this below)

Reporting Repairs

If a tenant spots a required repair, then it’s their responsibility to report it. Until the issue has been reported, landlords aren’t responsible for any repairs. If these necessary repairs are caused by the tenant, then landlords can charge for any costs incurred by repairing/replacing whatever’s been damaged.

While landlords need enough time to make any repairs, they must also do so within a reasonable timeframe. If not, then the tenant may be able to take their landlord to court. 

Landlords can make property inspections to check on the state of their property – including how tidy it is and whether any repairs are needed. A minimum of 24 hours notice needs to be given to make a property inspection.

Inventories / Itineraries

Landlords should provide their tenants with a full inventory of items that are included within the rental property. This should be given to tenants before their tenancy begins. These are important as they provide tenants with a visual of how the property and its contents looked before they moved in. When moving out, the property should be left to the same standard.

Inventories are often categorised room by room and usually include:

• White goods (such as fridges, freezers, washing machines and dishwashers)
• Electrical appliances
• Furniture
• Cleaning equipment
• Other household items (such as ovens, curtains and decorative pieces)

Keeping a Property Safe

The Fit for Human Habitation law is designed to ensure that all rented properties are safe and healthy to live in. The responsibilities within this law are the landlord’s duty.

Some of the guidelines that need to be followed include:

• Providing a safety check before tenants move in
• Having smoke alarms that are regularly tested
• Regularly inspecting gas equipment (such as boilers)
• All electrical items need to be in full working order. This means that they need to be regularly checked and deemed safe to use
• Kitchens and bathroom should be in a safe and sanitary condition
• Any damp and mould caused by leaky pipes or faulty windows need to be dealt with by the landlord
• Pest infestations also need to be quickly dealt with. Measures should then be taken to stop any potential re-infestation
• If the property is fully or partially furnished then all furnishings should comply with fire and furnishing regulations. Any soft furnishings need to have a ‘carelessness causes fire’ label

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What Utilities and Bills are Landlords Responsible For?

The main bills that landlords have to pay for are:

• Income tax
• Class 2 national insurance (this applies when your rental property is classed as running a business)
• House/buildings insurance
• Any bills incurred by repairs and maintenance that haven’t been directly caused by your tenants

What Utilities and Bills are Tenants Responsible For?

It’s up to you to decide which bills your tenants are responsible for. All of these bills that your tenants need to pay can be listed in the tenancy agreement. 

The bills that tenants usually tend to be responsible for paying are:

• Utility bills (including gas, electricity and water)
• Council tax
• TV licence
• Broadband

How to Ensure You Aren’t Responsible for Your Tenant’s Unpaid Bills

The easiest way to avoid this is by ensuring that your tenants’ names are registered to the relevant bills. Put simply, the general rule for bill paying is that it falls to the person whose name can be found on the bill. 

To further cover themselves, landlords can take the following steps:

• Create a clear tenancy agreement that states which bills (particularly utility bills) are the tenants’ responsibility. You should keep a signed copy of this contract in case it’s ever needed
• Inform the local council once new tenants have moved in. So they have all the necessary information, landlords should provide names and contact details of the new and old tenants
• Inform the relevant utility companies of any changes to the tenancy and get your tenants to put their names on the utility bills
• Make a note of meter readings. By doing this, you’ll have a record to provide utility companies with

Landlords can become responsible for paying outstanding bills if:

• The utility bills are in the landlord’s name
• The tenants didn’t register for utilities whilst living at the property

In this situation, you might still be able to prove that the tenant lived in your property by providing the utility company with your tenancy agreement. 

You can mark your property as being void of tenants so you become responsible for bills until more tenants enter the property.

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Tenancy Deposit and Deposit Protection

The tenancy deposit scheme was designed to help tenants safeguard their deposits. Provided they’ve met the terms of their tenancy agreement, tenants should get their deposit back within 10 days. 

Deposit protection is something that landlords legally have to provide. When it comes to deposit protection, landlords must protect tenant deposits with the scheme within 30 days of receiving them. They should also send their tenants any relevant deposit-related information within that same 30 day period.

These deposits can also benefit landlords. They’re designed to cover property damage and any unpaid rent. In both of these cases, landlords can deduct the cost from their tenant’s deposit. 

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