For landlords and renters

Does Awaab's Law apply to me?

Three questions. Whether the statutory periods apply here, what they are and when they start, and what the duty is when they do not reach you.

The tenancy

Is anyone's health or safety at immediate risk?
Who is the landlord?

This page is general information about repair duties in England. It is not legal advice and it is not a substitute for advice on your own tenancy. Nothing you type leaves your browser. We do not receive it, and nothing is saved.

For this tenancy

The duty still applies, without a fixed deadline

the statutory response periods are social housing law, so they do not reach a private tenancy, but the duties below do

  • WhyThe periods come from regulations made under section 10A of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, and section 10A(6) reaches a lease only where the landlord is a registered provider of social housing and the home is social housing. Section 60 of the Renters' Rights Act 2025 would extend an equivalent regime to private tenancies. It is not in force.
  • What does applySection 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 puts the repair of the structure, the exterior and the installations on the landlord. The duty arises once the landlord is on notice and the work has to be done within a reasonable time. There is no fixed number of days, and reasonable is measured against the hazard.
  • The other dutyUnder the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2018 the home has to be fit to live in at the start of the tenancy and throughout it. Damp and mould is one of the matters that goes to fitness, and a tenant can bring a claim directly.
  • Who enforces itThe council's environmental health team, under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System. They can inspect, score the hazard and serve an improvement notice. A tenant does not need the landlord's agreement to ask them to look.

Dates still decide these cases, because the duty runs from the date the landlord was put on notice. Keep the report as it was made, keep the date the landlord became aware, and keep what was done after it.

What the record has to show

Every period in this area runs from awareness

01The report as it was made

A text, an email, a note of a phone call, with its date. A managing agent receiving it is the landlord becoming aware, and the periods count from awareness rather than from the day a tenant first spoke.

02What was found, dated

Photographs with the room identified, and what was concluded about the cause. A picture with no room and no date proves very little later.

03What was done, and when

Whether a period is fixed or is measured by reasonableness, the gap nobody can explain is the one that costs.

Where the wording comes from

The guides this draws from

The law this rests on

The provisions, in their own words

The same record, read by both sides

The dates and the documents in one place, so neither side is working from a separate copy.

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