If you let residential property in England, you must carry out Right to Rent checks on every adult who will live there before the tenancy starts. Get it wrong and the penalty is up to £10,000 per occupier for a first breach and £20,000 for a repeat — and in the worst cases it is a criminal offence rather than a fine.
The scheme is not complicated, but it is unforgiving about detail. The check has to happen before occupation, it has to be done in a prescribed way, and you have to keep evidence in a prescribed form. Most penalties come from landlords who did check — just not quite properly.
This guide walks through who must be checked, the three permitted methods, the 28-day rule, follow-up checks, record-keeping, the penalties, and the updated code of practice that takes effect on 1 October 2026.
Key takeaways
- Right to Rent applies in England only, to every adult aged 18 or over who will occupy the property as their only or main home — named tenant or not.
- There are three lawful methods: a manual document check, a Home Office online check using the tenant’s share code, or an identity check through a certified digital identity service provider.
- The check must be completed before the tenancy begins, and no more than 28 days before the start date where the person’s right to rent is time-limited.
- Civil penalties are up to £5,000 per lodger and £10,000 per occupier for a first breach, rising to £10,000 and £20,000 for a repeat within three years.
- Keep a dated copy of the evidence for the whole tenancy and at least a year afterwards — without it you have no statutory excuse.
- Check everyone the same way. Selective checking based on how someone looks or sounds is race discrimination.
What the Right to Rent scheme requires
The scheme comes from the Immigration Act 2014 and has applied across England since 1 February 2016. It makes landlords responsible for confirming that anyone occupying their property as their only or main home has the immigration status to do so.
Three points are routinely misunderstood:
- It is England only. There is no equivalent duty in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland.
- It covers occupiers, not just tenants. An adult partner, an adult child, a friend moving in — if they will live there as their main home, they must be checked, even if they never sign the agreement. Our explainer on permitted occupiers covers how to record them properly.
- It applies to British and Irish citizens too. You are not checking whether someone is foreign; you are checking that everyone has a right to rent. Checking only some people is where discrimination claims start.
Who you must check — and who you do not
Check every adult occupier before they move in. Children under 18 do not need checking, but keep evidence of age if you are relying on that.
Some agreements are excluded from the scheme entirely. The main ones are:
- social housing let by a local authority;
- accommodation provided by a university or other education institution to its own students, or student accommodation let under a nomination agreement;
- care homes, hospitals, hospices and continuing healthcare accommodation;
- refuges, hostels and mobile homes sites;
- holiday lets and other accommodation that is not the occupier’s only or main home;
- leases of seven years or more.
If you are unsure whether an arrangement is excluded, check before you rely on it. A short-term let that has quietly become someone’s main home is not excluded any more.
The three ways to carry out a check
Only these three methods give you a statutory excuse against a penalty. Anything else — a photo of a passport sent by WhatsApp, a reference from a previous landlord, a copy the agent says they have — does not.
| Method | Who it suits | What you do |
|---|---|---|
| Manual document check | Anyone presenting acceptable original documents | Obtain originals, check them in the person’s presence (in person or over live video), copy and date them |
| Home Office online check | Anyone with an eVisa or digital immigration status | Use the tenant’s share code and date of birth on the government service, then check the photo matches |
| Certified digital identity check (IDVT) | British and Irish citizens with a valid passport | Use a provider on the government’s certified register; retain their output plus your own confirmation |
1. The manual document check
Four steps, in order, and the order matters:
- Obtain original documents from the approved lists. List A documents show a permanent right to rent; List B documents show a time-limited right.
- Check them in the presence of the holder — face to face, or on a live video call while you hold the originals.
- Satisfy yourself the documents are genuine, belong to that person, and that dates and photographs are consistent. Query anything that does not add up.
- Copy and date. Take a clear copy of the relevant pages and record the date you made the check on the copy itself.
Recording the date is the step people skip. An undated copy is evidence you saw a document at some point, not evidence you checked before the tenancy began — and that distinction is the whole statutory excuse.
2. The Home Office online check
Most people with immigration status now hold it digitally rather than on a card or a vignette. They generate a share code from their own account and give it to you with their date of birth. You enter both on the government’s landlord checking service, and it returns their right to rent status.
Two things to get right: you must view the photograph the service displays and be satisfied it is the person in front of you, and you must retain the response — a screenshot or PDF of the profile page — not just the share code. A share code on its own proves nothing later.
3. Certified digital identity checks (IDVT)
For British and Irish citizens holding a valid passport, you can use an identity service provider certified against the government’s trust framework to verify identity digitally. You still have to do your part: check the provider’s output, satisfy yourself the photograph is the person, and keep the evidence.
Use a provider that appears on the government’s certified register. An off-the-shelf ID app that is not certified will not give you a statutory excuse, however convincing its report looks.
The check, start to finish
Tenants and non-tenant occupiers aged 18 or over. Everyone gets checked, no exceptions.
Share code for digital status, manual check for original documents, certified IDVT for British and Irish passport holders.
And no earlier than 28 days before the tenancy start date where the right to rent is time-limited.
Clear copies or the online response, marked with the date the check was made.
Only needed where the right to rent is time-limited. Set the reminder the day you complete the first check.
The 28-day rule and timing
Where an occupier has a time-limited right to rent, the check must be carried out and recorded no earlier than 28 calendar days before the tenancy start date, and must be completed before they take occupation. Do it too early and it does not count; do it after move-in and you have already committed the breach.
Practically, that means the check belongs in the same slot as your other pre-tenancy work — alongside deposit protection, the gas safety record and the How to Rent guide. Our start-of-tenancy checklist puts them in a sensible order.
Follow-up checks
You only need a follow-up check where the occupier’s right to rent is time-limited. Someone with a permanent right to rent — a British or Irish citizen, or a person with indefinite leave — is checked once and that is the end of it.
Where the right is time-limited, your statutory excuse runs until the latest of: 12 months from the date of the check, the expiry of the person’s permission to be in the UK, or the expiry of the document you relied on. Diarise the follow-up for shortly before that date.
If a follow-up check shows someone no longer has a right to rent, you must report it to the Home Office. Doing so is what preserves your excuse — quietly doing nothing does not.
Records: what to keep, and for how long
Keep a clear, dated copy of whatever you relied on: the document copies, the online check response, or the certified provider’s output. Retain it for the duration of the tenancy and for at least a year after it ends.
These are identity documents, so data protection applies. Store them securely, restrict who can see them, and delete them once the retention period has passed rather than keeping them indefinitely “just in case”. Our GDPR guide for UK landlords covers retention and lawful basis in more detail.
The penalties
A repeat breach means a further breach within three years of the earlier one. Penalties are per person, so a four-bedroom house let to four unchecked adults is not one penalty — it is four.
There is a fast payment option that reduces a first-breach penalty by 30% if you pay in full within 21 days, and there is an objection and appeal route if you believe the penalty is wrong or you did have a statutory excuse. Use it rather than ignoring the notice.
Separately, letting to someone you know, or have reasonable cause to believe, does not have the right to rent is a criminal offence under the Immigration Act 2016, punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment and an unlimited fine. That is reserved for deliberate conduct, not paperwork slips — but it exists.
If you use a letting agent
An agent can carry out checks for you, but liability only transfers if you have agreed in writing that the agent is responsible for Right to Rent compliance. A vague management agreement that says the agent handles “referencing” will not do it.
Put the responsibility in the agency agreement explicitly, then ask for the evidence anyway and keep your own copy. If the agent cannot produce a dated record on request, that is a problem you want to find now rather than when a penalty notice arrives. Our comparison of using a letting agent covers what else should be nailed down in that contract.
Avoiding discrimination
The Home Office publishes a separate code of practice on avoiding unlawful discrimination when carrying out Right to Rent checks, and it is worth reading alongside the main code.
The rules are simple in principle. Check everyone, at the same stage of the process, in the same way. Do not ask for extra documents from people with foreign names or accents. Do not refuse someone because their permission is time-limited — a time-limited right to rent is still a right to rent. Do not advertise “British passport holders only”. Breaching the Equality Act 2010 is a separate liability from the immigration one, and both can bite at once.
What changes on 1 October 2026
An updated code of practice for landlords and their agents comes into force on 1 October 2026, replacing the version issued in January 2024. It reflects the shift to digital immigration status and the certified identity verification route rather than changing the penalty amounts.
If your check process was written before eVisas became the norm, this is the moment to update it: fewer physical documents, more share codes, and staff who know what a valid online response looks like.
Common mistakes
- Checking only the named tenant. Every adult occupier counts.
- Accepting a photo or scan by email. A manual check requires originals seen in the person’s presence, including over live video.
- Keeping the share code instead of the response. Codes expire; the retained profile page is the evidence.
- Forgetting to date the copy. Undated evidence undermines the statutory excuse.
- Missing a follow-up check. The excuse lapses on the date it lapses, whether or not you diarised it.
- Checking mid-tenancy when someone new moves in — late. A new adult occupier must be checked before they move in, not at the next inspection.
- Assuming the agent has it covered. Without a written transfer of responsibility, the liability is still yours.
What to do next
Audit your current tenancies this week: for each adult occupier, can you produce a dated record of a check made before they moved in? Where you cannot, do a check now — it does not retrospectively cure the breach, but it stops it continuing and shows good faith.
Then build the check into your onboarding so it happens every time. The official material is here: the Home Office collection on Right to Rent checks, the landlords’ code of practice, and the service to check if someone can rent your property in England.
Frequently asked questions
Do Right to Rent checks apply outside England?
No. The scheme applies in England only. There is no equivalent landlord duty in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland.
Do I have to check British citizens?
Yes. You must check every adult occupier, including British and Irish citizens. Checking only people you assume are foreign is unlawful discrimination.
Can I do the check over video call?
Yes for a manual check, provided you hold the original documents while you view the person on a live video call and they are the person the documents belong to. A scan or photograph on its own is not sufficient.
How long do I keep the records?
For the duration of the tenancy and at least one year after it ends. Store them securely and delete them once the retention period has passed.
What if a tenant’s permission expires during the tenancy?
Carry out a follow-up check before your statutory excuse expires. If the person no longer has a right to rent, report it to the Home Office — that report is what protects you.
Who pays the penalty if my agent got it wrong?
You do, unless you have a written agreement making the agent responsible for Right to Rent compliance. Put it in the agency agreement and keep copies of the evidence yourself.
Is there a discount for paying a penalty quickly?
Yes. A fast payment option reduces a first-breach penalty by 30% if the full amount is paid within 21 days. You can also object and appeal if you believe you had a statutory excuse.
Written by the Landlords Portal editorial team. This article is general information about the law in England, not legal advice. Immigration rules change frequently — always check the current Home Office guidance before carrying out a check.
