Ask Nik: "My tenants won’t pay rent because the boiler was broken for two weeks…?"
Question from a landlord:
“Hi Nik,
Our tenants had a period without a working boiler in September. It took around two weeks to get a part and have it repaired. Now they’re refusing to pay rent for the period they were without heating and hot water, saying the property was “unfit for human habitation”.
It’s all fixed, but are they entitled to a rent-free period?
Thanks,
Rhys.”
Nik’s reply:
Hi Rhys,
“Unfit for human habitation” is a phrase that’s been in English law since 2018, and Welsh law since 2022, so it’s fairly well known by now – and I’m seeing an increasing number of tenants using it. Does every fault automatically make the property unfit, and therefore rent-free for the affected period? Definitely not, but ChatGPT – which is being used by so many people now – is increasingly convincing tenants it does.
As a slight segway, an overreliance and mistrust in AI – not just amongst tenants – is a fast-growing concern of mine. It seems nobody wants to read legislation, official guidance or expert commentary anymore. Instead, people are putting complete faith in AI to argue their point for them, and not fact-checking. At the bottom of every screen, ChatGPT warns “ChatGPT can make mistakes. Check important info.” Judging by the number of emails we receive where the argument is fundamentally and demonstrably flawed (often quoting laws that doesn’t even exist in Wales!), very few people are taking heed of that warning. But that’s a topic for another day. Perhaps I’ll write a blog on it…
Back to your broken boiler. I think we have two separate questions to answer here:
- Was the property unfit?
- Is compensation due?
Let’s consider both.
What the law says
The Renting Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) (Wales) Regulations 2022 – FFHH, for short – say a property is unfit if:
- it fails one of the specific must-haves (wired smoke alarms, carbon monoxide alarms, electrical condition report), or
- There is a presence or occurrence – or a likely presence or occurrence – of the 29 prescribed ‘matters and circumstances’.
Only one of the 29 could realistically be the consequence of a broken boiler, which is: "#2: Cold - Exposure to excessively low temperatures."
So, timing matters. In summer? Almost certainly not unfit. In winter? Possibly.
Hot water alone is interesting. Although clearly essential to day-to-day life, a lack of it isn’t specifically listed as a reason a home is unfit, unless it also causes exposure to cold.
You mentioned the boiler was down in September. It’s safe to say the tenants were not exposed to “excessively low” temperatures at that time of the year, so I’m confident we’ve demonstrated the property was not legally unfit during this period. I’ll come onto whether compensation should be paid later.
Other strands of the law
Although they don’t address fitness, other legislation obliges the landlord to carry out the work:
- The Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 states that landlords are responsible for maintaining service installations, which is defined as “the supply of water, gas or electricity, for sanitation, for space heating or for heating water”.
- Housing Act 2004 introduced The Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS), which is what local authorities use to assess housing conditions and enforce standards. The FFHH criteria I mentioned earlier closely mirrors the 29 hazards considered under HHSRS, but importantly, FFHH doesn’t replace it. If a tenant reports an issue, the council will inspect using HHSRS. A broken boiler may be classed as a Category 1 hazard – where enforcement action is required – or Category 2, where action is optional. In practice, because landlords must legally maintain heating and hot water, authorities are likely to require repairs either way, with factors like time of year and tenant vulnerability influencing how serious it’s judged. They will issue a notice which provides a timescale for the work to be completed.
A reasonable time to repair
Something tenants (and ChatGPT!) often miss is that The Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 – and, by extension, every single Written Statement of Occupation Contract – makes clear that landlords aren’t responsible for repairs until they know about them. Then, they have a reasonable window to get the work done. Compensation would only be payable once that period had passed.
What counts as “reasonable” isn’t set in stone and only a court can decide for sure. In practice, it depends on things like:
- how urgent the repair is (a leaking pipe needs fixing faster than a wobbly chest of drawers)
- the time of year (heating problems in winter are more urgent than in summer)
- the occupant’s vulnerability (babies or elderly residents speed things up)
- contractor availability, including diagnosis and fitting, and any lead times for parts
Mitigation
I always tell landlords to think about mitigation too. Do the tenants have electric showers, so they at least have hot water? If getting the boiler fixed is going to take longer than usual – say, in winter, when demand is high and parts or engineers are in short supply – could you provide temporary portable heaters? They’re inexpensive and often cheaper than paying compensation for delayed repairs.
Compensation
Compensation is only due when somebody has suffered a loss. In housing, that usually means the tenants can’t use all or part of the property, or its facilities.
It’s usually calculated on a per-day basis, often using floor space as a guide. For example, if one room out of 13 total rooms was completely unusable, that room would represent about 7-8% of the daily rent. If only part of the room was affected, only a proportion of that amount would apply. These are just general rules of thumb – each situation is fact-specific. Losing access to the only bathroom, for instance, is far more significant than losing one of several spare rooms.
So where do I think you stand?
Based on what you’ve told me:
- The property wasn’t “unfit” in a legal sense during this two-week period.
- It’s doubtful the local authority had time to receive a complaint, visit, assess a hazard and issue a notice in that timeframe, so you almost certainly didn’t have an imposed deadline to work to.
- Compensation therefore hinges on two things:
o whether the tenants were genuinely affected, and
o whether the repair was completed within a reasonable period.
- In terms of impact: heating likely wasn’t needed in September, so its loss probably didn’t affect them. If they had electric showers, they still had hot water; if not, then lack of hot water has affected them and compensation is due if the repair wasn’t handled promptly. To help work out what’s “reasonable”, I tend to ask: could most other landlords have got this done substantially quicker? If yes, then it may fall outside a reasonable timeframe. The unknown here is parts availability. If the part needed to be ordered, two weeks isn’t necessarily excessive once you factor in attend → diagnose → order → deliver → return to fit. If the part was readily available locally, then two weeks may be pushing it – and if they lacked hot water, compensation for the period beyond “reasonable” may be appropriate.
- The house clearly wasn’t uninhabitable, so you’re not looking at the full rent for each day. See above for the usual calculation of compensation. It tends to be an art, not a science.
Practical guidance for all landlords
Keeping tenants updated in writing at each stage is key. In doing so, you’re showing you’re doing everything in your power to get the boiler up and running (i.e. you’re acting reasonably), you’re keeping them fully informed, and you create a clear paper trail in case any dispute arises later.
I also suggest keeping communication factual and removing all emotion. Quote the legislation and demonstrate how you’ve acted in accordance with it, and reasonably. If tenants wish to pursue a claim in court, they must follow the pre-action housing disrepair protocol.
Hope that helps.
All the best,
Nik
Director of Operations and Compliance Expert
CPS Homes
P.S. and a slight disclaimer: this isn’t legal advice – it’s just an honest, considered, best-of-my-knowledge answer.
Got a lettings question on your mind? Send it my way – I reply privately to every message, and I pick one each month to feature here (always anonymously).
The information contained within this article was correct at the date of publishing and is not guaranteed to remain correct in the present day.
