Landlords Are Recommended to Reference Tenants

Recent research showed that identity fraud in the UK has increased by 40%, with misdirected post addressed to landlords or tenants being a key for fraudsters to steal identities, thus gaining control of other people’s finances. In response to the research, one of the online sources for landlords has launched a new service, called Express Tenant Referencing, which costs only £5 + VAT.

The Express Tenant Referencing service includes various checks, which are expected to prevent the landlord from becoming a victim. The checks include: credit history (as far back as 6 years), anti-fraud and personal identity, credit history (as far back as 6 years), predictive risk scoring, bankruptcy, and, finally, County Court Judgments (CCJ). Landlords can also purchase Comprehensive Tenant Referencing service, which includes not only the above-mentioned checks, but also taking references from employers and previous tenants by highly professional tenant assessors.

Experts urge buy to let landlords to be extremely cautious when signing up contracts with new tenants these days, as statistics shows that the number of fraud cases has increased dramatically. At the same time, it has been said that nowadays fraud is being carried out on an opportunistic basis by people who have either run into financial problems or have seized a fraud opportunity. Of course, such people will lie about their background and credit history, which means that no truth can be revealed without appropriate checks. Asking tenants to provide references and bank statements is not a way out as fraudsters can easily make them up. Also, experts say that landlords should carry out a second tenant referencing when he or she is renewing the tenancy agreement; it is common sense that tenants prefer not to tell their landlords about any financial difficulty, should it occur, which means that landlords need to take preventative measures to avoid payment problems.