Right to Rent check

Right to Rent is a landlord duty in England under the Immigration Act 2014. Before a tenancy starts you must check that every adult who will occupy the property as their only or main home has the right to rent in the UK. Do it correctly and you have a "statutory excuse": a defence against a civil penalty (up to £5,000 per lodger and £10,000 per occupier, with criminal liability for knowingly renting to a disqualified person). Skip it, check the wrong way, or miss a follow-up, and you lose that protection. This wizard tells you which of the three check routes applies and whether you will need to check again.

The check method depends on the occupier’s status and documents. British and Irish citizens can be checked from original acceptable documents, or through a digital verification provider registered on the OFDIA register for right to rent checks. Anyone with an eVisa can only be checked online: they get a share code at gov.uk/prove-right-to-rent and you check it at gov.uk/view-right-to-rent. People of other nationalities without an eVisa can still use original acceptable documents, but biometric residence cards and permits can no longer be accepted. A new landlords’ code of practice applies to checks due from 1 October 2026.

The online share-code check is now the workhorse of Right to Rent. The prospective tenant generates a share code from their own gov.uk account and gives it to you with their date of birth; you enter both on the landlord checking page and see a result that confirms their right to rent and, importantly, whether it is unlimited or time-limited. You should keep a copy of the online check result. If a person genuinely cannot provide documents or a share code (for example, an outstanding Home Office application) you use the Home Office Landlord Checking Service. It answers within two working days, and you should wait for the answer before the tenancy starts. A yes, a Positive Right to Rent Notice, gives you a statutory excuse for 12 months from the date it gives.

The unlimited-versus-time-limited distinction is what drives follow-up checks. British and Irish citizens and people with settled status or indefinite leave to remain have an unlimited right to rent: you check once and never again for that tenancy. People on a time-limited visa (skilled worker, student, pre-settled status, dependants) have a time-limited right. Check them no earlier than 28 days before the tenancy starts. Your statutory excuse then lasts until whichever of these is latest: 12 months from your check, the end of their permission, or the expiry of the document they showed, and you must carry out a follow-up check before it ends to keep it running. If the follow-up shows they no longer have the right to rent, report it to the Home Office. Diary that date the moment you do the initial check; the most common Right to Rent failure is not a bad first check but a forgotten follow-up.

Process discipline protects you in two directions. First, you must check every adult occupier, not just the named tenant: a partner, an adult child or a friend who moves in is within scope. Second, you must apply exactly the same process to everyone and never base a letting decision on someone’s nationality, accent or perceived immigration status; doing so risks unlawful discrimination under the Equality Act 2010, and the Government’s own code of practice warns landlords against it. The safe posture is a uniform check for every applicant, recorded identically, with the evidence retained.

Keep the evidence for the life of the tenancy and for a year after it ends, then destroy it securely. For a manual check that means a clear copy of each document, front and back where it has one, in a format that cannot be altered, with a record of the date you made the check; for an online check, a clear copy of the result with its date; for the Landlord Checking Service, its response. If you ever face a civil penalty referral, the statutory excuse stands or falls on whether you can produce the right evidence for the right person at the right time, which is exactly the record this wizard helps you structure.