Right to rent checks: the 20-minute process that avoids a £20,000 penalty

Who must be checked

Every occupier aged 18 or over who will live at the property as their only or main home — tenants on the agreement, their partners, adult children, and adult lodgers of your tenant. Checking only the lead tenant is the single most common failure.

Check everyone equally. Only checking people who "seem foreign" is unlawful discrimination, and the Home Office code of practice is explicit: run the same check on every adult, British passports included.

The three ways to check

Use whichever route fits the person’s documents:

• •Manual check — inspect original documents (e.g. British/Irish passport, including expired) in the person’s presence (in person or live video call while you hold the originals), copy them, date the copy
• •Home Office online check — the person gives you a share code; verify at gov.uk "view a tenant’s right to rent"; keep the response with their photo
• •Identity service provider (IDSP) — certified digital check for British/Irish passport holders; keep the IDSP output

Time-limited status and follow-up checks

If someone’s permission to stay is time-limited, your statutory excuse is also time-limited: re-check before the later of one year from the first check or the expiry of their permission. Diarise it — a lapsed follow-up check removes your protection even if the original check was perfect.

If a follow-up check shows the person no longer has the right to rent, you must report to the Home Office to keep your excuse. You do not have to evict — reporting is what protects you.

The evidence you must keep

Your statutory excuse is only as good as your records. For each adult keep, for the tenancy plus one year:

• •Clear copies of the checked documents (passport: photo page and any relevant endorsements) or the online check result with photo
• •The date of the check, recorded on the copy ("checked on [date]")
• •For online checks: the share-code result page showing the photo you compared
• •Your follow-up diary date where status was time-limited

Traps that catch careful landlords

The breaches that show up in penalty cases:

• •Checking after move-in — the check must be done before the tenancy starts
• •Accepting photocopies or WhatsApp photos instead of originals or a share code
• •Missing an adult occupier who is not on the tenancy agreement
• •Letting a follow-up date lapse for someone with time-limited status
• •No dated copies — an undocumented check is no check at all in a penalty case

How LetClerk handles it

Right to rent is one of the twelve obligations on every LetClerk property register. On the Compliance Managed service we run the checklist with you before each move-in, store the dated evidence on the property’s trail, and diarise every follow-up check so time-limited statuses never lapse silently. The free compliance score will tell you in 3 minutes whether this obligation is marked verified for your property.

Common questions

Do I need to check British citizens?

Yes — everyone aged 18+ gets the same check. A British passport (current or expired) satisfies it. Checking selectively based on accent, name or appearance is discrimination under the code of practice.

My tenancy started years ago and I never checked. What now?

The duty attached when the tenancy was granted (checks became mandatory England-wide in February 2016). You cannot backdate a statutory excuse, but running and documenting a check now materially improves your position, and a follow-up regime protects you going forward.

Can my letting agent do the checks for me?

Yes, if the agreement with the agent says so in writing — the responsibility (and penalty exposure) then sits with the agent. Self-managing landlords carry it personally, which is exactly where LetClerk steps in.

What about lodgers in my own home?

Right to rent applies to lodgers too — anyone renting living space as their main home, even under an informal arrangement. The same checks and the same penalties apply.

What if someone has an outstanding Home Office application?

They may still have a right to rent — use the online share-code route, or the Landlord Checking Service where they cannot produce documents. A "yes" from the checking service gives you a six-month excuse; diarise the re-check.