For landlords

How do I check a letting agent is legitimate?

Guide · about 22 min read · Covers the law in England as at November 2026 · Reviewed on 2 November 2026

There is no register of approved letting agents in England, and no check in this guide establishes that an agent is legitimate. What can be checked is three statutory duties, each of which bites on its own conditions rather than on every agent; meeting them says nothing about how well an agent does the work, and it is not a statement that the agent complies with everything else the law asks of it. Article 3(1) of S.I. 2014/2359 requires a person who engages in lettings agency work to belong to a redress scheme approved or designated by the Secretary of State. Regulation 3(1) of S.I. 2019/386 requires an agent who holds client money to belong to an approved or designated client money protection scheme. Section 83 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires a list of fees to be displayed at premises where the agent deals face to face and published on the agent's website if it has one, carrying the name of each scheme the agent is required to belong to. So these are preliminary checks against the statutory duties, not a test that returns a pass or a fail on an agent. VEYLO X is a software platform for renting and letting in England.

What can I check in five minutes before I ring an agent?

The agent's own website, where there is one, because it is the quickest of the places the law names. It is not the only one: section 83(2) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 puts the fee list at premises where the agent deals face to face, subsections (3A) to (3C) reach a third party website the agent advertises on, and an agent with no website of its own is not therefore outside the duty. Each duty is conditional, which is why an empty page is a question rather than a finding. Section 83(3) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires a letting agent to publish a list of its relevant fees on its website, if it has a website. Section 83(6) provides that where the agent is required to be a member of a client money protection scheme for that work, the duty includes a duty to display or publish, with the list of fees, a statement that indicates membership and gives the name of the scheme. Section 83(7) does the same for a redress scheme. So where the agent has a website, that one page should carry the fees, the name of each scheme it is required to belong to for the work, and nothing where a duty does not apply. The client money certificate is conditional twice over: regulation 4(1)(c) of S.I. 2019/386 puts a copy on the website if there is one, and regulation 4(A1) applies that paragraph only where the scheme administrator has provided a certificate.

Two further subsections cover an agent that advertises elsewhere. They have separate triggers. Subsection (3A) applies to an agent who is carrying on letting agency work in relation to a dwelling-house in England and advertises that dwelling-house on a third party website "as a dwelling-house which a landlord is seeking to let on a tenancy". Subsection (3B) applies separately to an agent who, on a third party website, advertises letting agency work carried on by the agent in relation to dwelling houses in England. Either way subsection (3C) then requires the agent to ensure that a list of its relevant fees is published on that website, or that there is a link to the part of its own website where the list is published. An absence is an observation rather than a breach, because a breach needs a duty that applied on those facts, and the three duties above each have conditions. Where a duty did apply, section 87(3) and (7) allow a local weights and measures authority to impose a financial penalty not exceeding £5,000 for a breach of a duty imposed by or under section 83. What a particular absence means for a particular agent is not something this guide answers.

Which scheme membership does the law require of a letting agent?

Membership of a redress scheme, since 2014. Article 3(1) of the Redress Schemes for Lettings Agency Work and Property Management Work (Requirement to Belong to a Scheme etc) (England) Order 2014 provides that "A person who engages in lettings agency work must be a member of a redress scheme for dealing with complaints in connection with that work". Article 3(2) requires that scheme to be one approved by the Secretary of State, or designated by the Secretary of State as a government administered redress scheme. Article 3(3) provides that a complaint there is "a complaint made by a person who is or has been a prospective landlord or a prospective tenant". Article 5 imposes the same requirement on a person who engages in property management work.

The Order is made under sections 83 and 84 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013, and section 83(7) of that Act is where lettings agency work is defined: "things done by any person in the course of a business in response to instructions received from" a prospective landlord or a prospective tenant, as those two are defined there. Section 83(8) takes out of that definition publishing advertisements or disseminating information, and providing a means of direct contact or continued direct communication between a prospective landlord and a prospective tenant, when done by a person who does no other things falling within subsection (7). Section 83(9)(a) excludes things done by a local authority. Articles 4 and 6 of the Order carry further exclusions.

What is client money protection, and when must an agent have it?

It is compensation cover, and what triggers it is holding client money as regulation 2 defines that term, not holding money as such. Regulation 3(1) of the Client Money Protection Schemes for Property Agents (Requirement to Belong to a Scheme etc.) Regulations 2019 provides that "A property agent who holds client money must be a member of an approved or designated client money protection scheme". Regulation 2 defines client money as money received by a property agent in the course of English letting agency work within the meaning of section 54 of the Housing and Planning Act 2016, or English property management work within the meaning of section 55, and held on behalf of another person, but not money held in accordance with an authorised tenancy deposit scheme within the meaning of Chapter 4 of Part 6 of the Housing Act 2004.

What the cover is worth is a separate question from whether it exists, and it is answered on the certificate rather than in these Regulations. Under regulation 5(1)(a)(iii) and (1A) of S.I. 2018/751 the Secretary of State may approve a scheme whose rules require the scheme administrator to make good a member's liability only up to a stated amount, only within an aggregate limit on the scheme as a whole, or only for certain risks. Where that is so, regulation 8(1B) requires the certificate to state the amount or the limit, or to say where to find information about the risks. Rent an agent collects is the usual candidate for client money, and it is a candidate rather than a conclusion: regulation 2 asks whether the money was received in the course of English letting agency work or English property management work, whether it is held on behalf of another person, and whether the tenancy deposit scheme exclusion takes it out, and collecting rent on its own settles none of the three. A certificate is a disclosure document rather than a guarantee: it records what the scheme administrator certified when it was issued, and what could in fact be recovered turns on the scheme's own rules and on the arrangement as well as on the figure printed there. Whether a particular arrangement for a particular property amounts to holding client money, and what a particular scheme's limits come to, are questions on the facts, and this guide does not answer them.

How do I check the scheme an agent names is one the Secretary of State approved?

Against the lists the government publishes, because article 3(2) of S.I. 2014/2359 asks for approval or designation rather than for any scheme. GOV.UK publishes Lettings agents and property managers: redress schemes, and sets out the duty from the agent's side at Registering with a redress scheme as a property agent. For client money, GOV.UK publishes Protecting clients' money if you're a property agent.

The check itself is a comparison of two names, and it answers one question only. Take the scheme name the agent publishes with its list of fees, under section 83(6) or section 83(7) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015, and look for that name on the relevant GOV.UK list. A name that does not appear is a question to put to the agent rather than a conclusion, because a scheme can be named loosely or an abbreviation used. What the comparison cannot tell you is whether that agent belongs to the scheme today. Article 3(1) of S.I. 2014/2359 requires the person to "be a member of a redress scheme", and regulation 4(2) and (3) of S.I. 2019/386 show that membership can end or change after a certificate has been issued, by requiring an agent to tell each client in writing within 14 days if the membership is revoked or the agent moves to another approved or designated scheme. So current membership is a separate enquiry, and the scheme the agent names is the body able to answer it. This guide does not say what a particular mismatch means.

How do I get a copy of the agent's client money protection certificate?

You ask for it, and for a person who may reasonably require it, it is free. Two conditions sit on that. Regulation 4(A1) of S.I. 2019/386 applies paragraph (1) only if the scheme administrator provides a certificate under regulation 8(1) of the scheme approval regulations, and the free copy in regulation 4(1)(d) is owed "to any person who may reasonably require it" rather than to anyone who asks. Regulation 4(1) applies where the scheme administrator has provided the agent with a certificate confirming its membership of the approved or designated client money protection scheme, and then requires the agent to display that certificate at each of its premises in England at which it deals face to face with persons using or proposing to use its services and at a place in each of those premises where the certificate is likely to be seen, to publish a copy of the certificate on its website if it has one, and to "produce a copy of the certificate to any person who may reasonably require it, free of charge".

Regulation 4(2) adds a duty to notify each client in writing if the membership is revoked, or if the agent leaves one approved or designated scheme and joins another. Regulation 4(3) requires that notification to be given to each established client within 14 days of the event, and, where the agent has changed scheme, to give the name and address of the new scheme. Regulation 7 allows a financial penalty not exceeding £5,000 for a breach of regulation 4, and regulation 7(3) provides that it does not apply to a breach of regulation 4(1) where the agent took all reasonable steps to obtain a copy of the certificate and the scheme administrator did not provide it. Asking the agent for the certificate and asking the named scheme whether the membership is current are two separate enquiries, and the certificate answers only the first.

What must an agent publish about its fees?

A list, in the places section 83 names, with the content section 83(4) sets. Section 83(1) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires a letting agent to publicise details of its relevant fees. Section 83(2) requires the agent to display a list of the fees at each of its premises at which it deals face to face with persons using or proposing to use services to which the fees relate, and at a place in each of those premises at which the list is likely to be seen. Section 83(3) requires publication on the agent's website, if it has one, and subsections (3A) to (3C) extend that to a third party website the agent advertises on.

Section 83(4) is the part that makes a list useful rather than decorative. The list must include "a description of each fee that is sufficient to enable a person who is liable to pay it to understand the service or cost that is covered by the fee or the purpose for which it is imposed", for a fee tenants are liable to pay "an indication of whether the fee relates to each dwelling-house or each tenant", and "the amount of each fee inclusive of any applicable tax or, where the amount of a fee cannot reasonably be determined in advance, a description of how that fee is calculated". Section 83(6) and section 83(7) then put the two scheme statements with that list. One thing section 83 does not do is make a published fee a lawful one. It is a disclosure duty, and whether a particular payment may be charged at all is a separate question under the Tenant Fees Act 2019: section 1 prohibits a landlord from requiring a relevant person to make a prohibited payment in connection with a tenancy of housing in England, section 2 does the same for a letting agent, and a payment is prohibited unless Schedule 1 permits it. A fee appearing on a list is not a statement that it is payable. Our guide on letting a property without a letting agent sets out what that involves.

What happens to an agent who is not in a redress scheme?

A penalty, on the lower standard of proof. Article 8(1) of S.I. 2014/2359 provides that where an enforcement authority is satisfied on the balance of probabilities that a person has failed to comply with the requirement to belong to a redress scheme under article 3 or article 5, the authority may by notice require the person to pay the authority a monetary penalty of such amount as the authority may determine. Article 8(2) provides that the amount "must not exceed £5,000", and article 8(3) points to the Schedule for the procedure. Article 2 defines the enforcement authority as a district council, a London borough council, the Common Council of the City of London in its capacity as a local authority, or the Council of Isles of Scilly.

Failing to publish the membership is a separate breach with a separate penalty. Section 87(3) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 allows a local weights and measures authority satisfied on the balance of probabilities of a breach of a duty imposed by or under section 83 to impose a financial penalty, section 87(7) caps it at £5,000, and section 87(6A) allows more than one penalty in England where the breach continues after the end of 28 days beginning with the day after the final notice was served, unless an appeal is brought in that period. Schedule 9 to that Act gives the procedure and the appeal.

Who do I report an agent to?

It depends which duty is in question, and there are three routes. For client money, regulation 5(1) of S.I. 2019/386 makes it the duty of every local authority in England to enforce regulations 3 and 4 in its area, and regulation 5(1A) makes that duty subject to regulation 8(3) and to section 26 of the Tenant Fees Act 2019. Regulation 6(1) applies where a local authority in England is satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that a property agent has breached regulation 3, and regulation 6(2) caps the penalty at £30,000. Regulation 7(1) sets the same standard for a breach of regulation 4 and regulation 7(2) caps the penalty at £5,000. Beyond reasonable doubt is a higher standard than the balance of probabilities that article 8 of S.I. 2014/2359 and section 87 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 use.

For the fees duty, section 87(1) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 makes it the duty of every local weights and measures authority in England and Wales to enforce that Chapter in its area, and section 87(1A) makes that duty subject to section 26 of the Tenant Fees Act 2019. For redress, two different things get asked and they go to different places. A complaint about an agent that is in a scheme goes to the scheme, and article 3(3) of S.I. 2014/2359 sets who that is for: a complaint "made by a person who is or has been a prospective landlord or a prospective tenant". An agent that is in no scheme at all is not a matter for a scheme, because there is no membership for a complaint to be made under, and that is for the enforcement authority, which article 2 of the Order defines as a district council, a London borough council, the Common Council of the City of London in its capacity as a local authority, or the Council of Isles of Scilly, with article 8 as the penalty it may impose. These three are not interchangeable and they are not a list of everything available: a scheme's complaint jurisdiction, a local authority's enforcement powers and the ordinary legal remedies are different things with different limits. Which of them fits a particular problem, and whether a complaint is in time or in scope, is a question for the body you approach and for an adviser, not for this guide.

What do these rules not do for me?

They are duties with penalties attached, and they are not a licence, a register or a quality mark. Nothing in article 3 of S.I. 2014/2359, regulation 3 of S.I. 2019/386 or section 83 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 says anything about whether an agent is competent, careful or good at the work. Redress is a route for a complaint from the class of person article 3(3) names. Client money protection goes to compensation being available if the agent fails to account for the money, which is a different thing from the service being well done, and under regulation 5(1A) of S.I. 2018/751 that compensation can itself be capped.

The scope limits matter as much as the duties. Section 83(8) and section 83(9) of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 and articles 4 and 6 of S.I. 2014/2359 each take described things outside lettings agency work or property management work, and article 4, for example, is framed around an employer, a hirer and a person for whom a prospective tenant provides work or services, together with an institution within the meaning of paragraph 5 of Schedule 1 to the Local Government Finance Act 1992 and an authorised person within the meaning of section 18 of the Legal Services Act 2007. Whether a particular agent's work for a particular landlord falls inside or outside any of those is a judgement on the facts of the arrangement, and this guide does not make it.

What do I do next?

Seven steps, and the first is the one to take if any of the open questions above touch your letting. VEYLO X is a software platform for renting and letting in England.

Take advice before signing an agency agreement you are unsure about, and in particular on anything in it about money held on your behalf. A solicitor or a housing adviser can read the actual agreement.
Read the agent's website for the list of fees, the redress scheme statement and, where client money is held, the client money protection statement. Section 83(3), (6) and (7) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 put all three there where the agent has a website.
Then look wherever the agent advertises rather than only at its own site. Subsections (3A) to (3C) of section 83 require the fee list, or a link to it, on a third party website the agent advertises a property or its own letting agency work on, so an agent with no website of its own is not outside the duty.
Compare each scheme name against the GOV.UK list of approved and designated schemes, since article 3(2) of S.I. 2014/2359 asks for approval or designation by the Secretary of State. That comparison answers whether the scheme is approved, not whether this agent belongs to it.
Ask for a copy of the client money protection certificate, and ask the named scheme separately whether the membership is current, since regulation 4(2) and (3) of S.I. 2019/386 require an agent to give notice of a change only after it has happened. Regulation 4(1) requires the agent to produce a copy of the certificate to any person who may reasonably require it, free of charge.
Read what the certificate says about the limits of the cover, because regulation 8(1B) of S.I. 2018/751 requires a certificate to state any cap on the amount the scheme will make good, any aggregate limit on the scheme as a whole, or where to find information about excluded risks. What a certificate states is information about the cover, not an operative promise: what could be recovered turns on the scheme's own rules, its exclusions and the circumstances, and the certificate is not the only record of whether the membership is still current.
Keep a dated copy of the certificate, the scheme names and the fee list as they stood on the day you signed, and note that regulation 4(2) and (3) require the agent to tell you in writing, within 14 days for an established client, if the membership is revoked or the scheme changes.

Three questions are left open, and each of them can decide the position for one letting. Does a particular agent's work fall inside lettings agency work or property management work, or inside one of the exclusions? Is a particular sum held by the agent client money within regulation 2 of S.I. 2019/386? And what does your agency agreement say about money held on your behalf? An adviser who can read the actual agency agreement and your instructions to the agent is the person to put all three to. Our guides on what you need to do to let a property and what records a landlord should keep cover the rest of the paperwork.

Common questions

Do these rules apply if the agent only finds me a tenant and does not manage the property?

Finding a tenant is the work the redress duty is built around, so the starting point is that it applies. Section 83(7) of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 defines lettings agency work as things done by any person in the course of a business in response to instructions received from a prospective landlord, meaning a person seeking to find another person wishing to rent a dwelling-house in England under a domestic tenancy and, having found such a person, to grant such a tenancy, or from a prospective tenant as defined there. Article 3(1) of S.I. 2014/2359 then requires membership of a redress scheme for complaints in connection with that work, and article 5 covers property management work separately, so an agent that only lets and does not manage is not outside the scheme on that ground. Section 83(8) and section 83(9) of the 2013 Act and article 4 of S.I. 2014/2359 carry the exclusions. Whether a particular agent's work falls inside any of them is a judgement on the facts, and this guide does not make it.

Does an online only agent with no high street office have to do the same things?

The duties that do not depend on having premises apply in the same way, and the ones framed around premises are framed that way for everyone. Article 3(1) of S.I. 2014/2359 and regulation 3(1) of S.I. 2019/386 are about engaging in the work and about holding client money, not about having an office. Section 83(3) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires the fee list on the agent's website if it has one, and subsections (3A) to (3C) require it on a third party website the agent advertises on, or a link to it. Regulation 4(1)(c) of S.I. 2019/386 requires a copy of the client money protection certificate on the agent's website if it has one, and regulation 4(A1) applies that paragraph only where the scheme administrator has provided a certificate. The display duties in section 83(2) and regulation 4(1)(b) are tied to premises at which the agent deals face to face, so they have nothing to bite on where there are none. One caution on section 83(8) of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013: it excludes publishing advertisements and providing a means of direct contact only when done by a person who does no other things within subsection (7), and whether that fits a particular business is not a question this guide answers.

Is a trade body membership the same as a redress scheme?

No, and the test is the words of the Order rather than the standing of the body. Article 3(2) of S.I. 2014/2359 requires the redress scheme to be one approved by the Secretary of State or designated by the Secretary of State as a government administered redress scheme, and section 83(2) of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 defines a redress scheme as one which provides for complaints against members of the scheme to be investigated and determined by an independent person. So the thing to look for is the scheme name on the GOV.UK list, not a logo or a membership badge. A trade body can run a code of practice and a complaints process of its own, and an agent can belong to one as well, but belonging to it is not the duty article 3(1) imposes. Section 83(7) of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires the agent to publish the name of the redress scheme with its fee list, which is the name to take to the list.

What if the agent holds my rent in its own current account?

What triggers regulation 3 is the money answering the definition, and the account it sits in is not part of that definition. Regulation 2 of S.I. 2019/386 defines client money as money received by a property agent in the course of English letting agency work or English property management work and held on behalf of another person, other than money held in accordance with an authorised tenancy deposit scheme, and regulation 3(1) requires an agent who holds client money to be a member of an approved or designated client money protection scheme. So the questions are whether the work is English letting agency work or English property management work, whether the money is held on behalf of another person, and whether it falls inside the tenancy deposit scheme exclusion, and this guide answers none of the three for a particular arrangement. What the membership is worth if the money goes missing depends on the scheme's own limits, which regulation 8(1B) of S.I. 2018/751 requires the certificate to state. Those Regulations do not themselves prescribe an account, and that is not the end of it, because the conditions for approving a scheme do. Regulation 5(1)(a)(ii) of S.I. 2018/751 requires an approved scheme's rules to require its members to meet the conditions in regulation 5(2), and regulation 5(2)(f) is to "hold client money in a client money account with a bank or building society authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority". Regulation 5(3) defines a client money account as one holding nothing but client money, apart from money replacing a sum withdrawn in error and the interest on those amounts, and whose title includes the word "client" or an appropriate abbreviation of it. So an agent in an approved scheme is reached on the account through its scheme's rules, and whether a particular agent is keeping to them is not something this guide can tell you. If the money has been mixed with the agent's own, that is a question to take to an adviser, and to the local authority that regulation 5(1) makes responsible for enforcing regulations 3 and 4 in its area.

Sources

The primary sources behind this guide. Where the law and a summary disagree, the law is what counts.

This article is general information, not legal advice. It covers England only and reflects the position as at November 2026. For your own situation, take advice, and consider free advice from Citizens Advice or Shelter.

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