You already suspect your landlord broke the law. The question now is whether you can prove it well enough to get your money back at the First-tier Tribunal.
A Rent Repayment Order lets renters in England reclaim rent from a landlord who committed a specific offence. Under the Renters' Rights Act 2025, that list of offences has grown, and for offences from 1 May 2026 the maximum doubled from 12 months' rent to 2 years. For a licensing offence that started before that date, the pre-May part stays under the old 12-month rules, so a full 2 years under the new cap cannot build up until 2028. Wales has a different, narrower regime run by the Residential Property Tribunal.
Winning at tribunal comes down to picking the right offence, building the right evidence bundle, and avoiding procedural mistakes.
Which landlord offences trigger a rent repayment order?
Not every landlord failing gives rise to an RRO. The tribunal can only award one if your landlord committed a qualifying offence. Get this wrong at the start and the rest of your case collapses.
The core offences under the Housing and Planning Act 2016 include:
- Renting out a property that requires an HMO licence without one
- Renting out a property subject to selective licensing without a licence
- Breaching a banning order
- Unlawfully evicting or harassing you
- Using or threatening violence to get into the property
- Failing to comply with an improvement notice or prohibition order
The Renters' Rights Act 2025 added further qualifying offences. The ones in force from 1 May 2026 are knowingly or recklessly misusing a possession ground, re-letting or re-marketing the property during the restricted period after serving notice on a moving-in or selling ground (from the notice until 12 months after the earliest date the notice gives for court proceedings), and continuing a tenancy-reform breach after a civil penalty. Three more (one tied to the landlord redress scheme, two to the Private Rented Sector Database) have not yet been brought into force.
Before filing, identify which offence applies to your situation. A landlord can be a terrible landlord and still not qualify. Mould, broken boilers, ignored repairs are serious problems, but they are not RRO offences on their own. They are disrepair claims.
Unlicensed HMO and selective licensing claims are often the easiest to build, because the facts can be checked against public council records.
How to check whether your landlord has a licence
This is where most cases either get built or fall apart before they start.
For HMO licensing, check your local council's public register. Most councils publish this online. In England, if you live in a shared house with five or more people across two or more households, a mandatory HMO licence is usually required. Smaller HMOs may need a licence under additional licensing schemes, which vary by borough. Our guide to renting an unlicensed HMO explains the different licence categories in plain terms.
For selective licensing, your local council will have a map or register of designated areas. Hackney, Islington, Westminster and dozens of other boroughs now run selective licensing schemes. Check the dates carefully. The offence period is when your landlord was unlicensed while you were paying rent, not when you discovered it.
If you find no licence, download or screenshot the search result immediately. Councils sometimes update their registers and you want a timestamped record of what you found and when.
What evidence do you need for a First-tier Tribunal RRO claim?
The tribunal applies the criminal standard of proof, meaning beyond reasonable doubt. It must be sure the offence occurred during the period you were paying rent, even though the rent repayment order itself is a civil remedy. This is a higher bar than the balance of probabilities used in disrepair or deposit claims, but documentary evidence such as a council licensing search usually clears it.
Build your bundle around four categories:
1. Proof of tenancy and rent payments. Your tenancy agreement plus bank statements showing each rent payment. The tribunal will calculate its award against the rent you paid in the relevant period, minus any Universal Credit housing element paid towards your rent, so gaps in payment records can reduce your award.
2. Proof of the offence. For an unlicensed HMO or selective licensing breach, a screenshot or letter from the council confirming no licence existed is the clearest possible evidence. If the council took enforcement action, include any improvement notice, civil penalty notice, or conviction. For offences from 1 May 2026, a conviction or a civil penalty that can no longer be appealed makes the maximum award mandatory, unless there are exceptional circumstances.
3. Proof the landlord knew. Not knowing about licensing is not automatically a defence, but a landlord can argue a 'reasonable excuse', and the tribunal judges whether their ignorance was objectively reasonable and for how long (Marigold v Wells [2023] UKUT 33 (LC)). Council letters, emails or adverts showing the landlord knew, or should have known, help defeat it.
4. Chronology. A simple timeline document showing when the tenancy started, when the offence began, when it ended, and the rent paid across that period. Tribunals see hundreds of cases. Making the panel's job easier is not a small thing.
Avoid padding your bundle with irrelevant complaints. A tribunal member reading 200 pages of WhatsApp arguments about a broken shower will find it harder to focus on the licensing point you are trying to prove.
How much will the tribunal award in a rent repayment order?
Winning the right to an RRO and winning the maximum possible amount are two different things.
The cap depends on the offence. For licensing, improvement-notice, prohibition-order and banning-order offences, and a tenancy-reform breach continued after a civil penalty, it is rent paid while the offence was being committed, up to 2 years for offences on or after 1 May 2026 or 12 months for earlier offences. For unlawful eviction, harassment, violent entry and misuse of a possession ground, it is rent paid in the 2 years ending on the offence date (12 months if the offence was before 1 May 2026). For re-letting or re-marketing during the restricted period, it is the 2 years ending on the offence date or, if earlier, the end of your tenancy.
Usually the tribunal decides the amount up to that cap. Section 44 requires it to take into account the conduct of both parties, the landlord's financial circumstances, and whether the landlord has previous convictions, financial penalties or RROs. The Upper Tribunal also expects it to weigh the seriousness of the offence (Acheampong v Roman [2022] UKUT 239 (LC)). But for offences from 1 May 2026, section 46 says it must award the maximum, unless there are exceptional circumstances, if the landlord has been convicted of the offence or has a civil penalty for it that can no longer be appealed, or has previously been convicted, penalised or had an RRO for the same offence. For earlier offences, a conviction or final penalty made the maximum mandatory only for eviction, harassment, violent entry, improvement-notice, prohibition-order and banning-order offences, not licensing offences.
In practice, tribunals have awarded anywhere from a few months' rent to the full cap. Landlords who were completely unaware of a new licensing scheme and rectified the situation quickly tend to get lower awards. Landlords who ignored multiple council notices, stonewalled tenants, or committed multiple offences get hit harder.
Your conduct matters too. Where the tribunal is setting the amount, refusing access for inspections, failing to pay rent, or behaving unreasonably in correspondence can reduce the award. Keep your communications professional throughout.
One practical point on multiple offences. You cannot recover more than the rent you paid for the same period, so overlapping offences over the same months do not multiply your award. Where a landlord's offences fall in different, non-overlapping periods, the tribunal can take each into account, and where it has discretion, it reserves a full-rent award for the most serious offending. The RRO1 form step-by-step guide explains how to present multiple grounds correctly without undermining your primary claim.
What mistakes lose rent repayment order cases at tribunal?
Check the time limit first, because a late application cannot be rescued. You must apply within 2 years of the end of the offence for offences on or after 1 May 2026, or 12 months for earlier offences. Once that window closes there is no discretion to extend it. Check the dates before you do anything else.
Another common mistake is confusing the offence period with the tenancy period. For a licensing offence you can only recover rent paid while the offence was occurring. If your landlord was unlicensed for eight months of a two-year tenancy, your claim covers eight months of rent, not 24.
A third mistake is inadequate evidence of rent payments. Bank statements are stronger than receipts. If you paid cash and have no records, you will struggle to prove the exact amounts. Start collecting these now.
A fourth is getting the landlord's details wrong. Give the landlord's correct full name and current address, and any superior landlord's, on form RRO1, because the tribunal sends your application to them from that. Then follow the tribunal's directions for sending your bundle to the landlord, and keep proof of sending.
A fifth is negotiating an informal settlement mid-application and then resuming the claim without updating the tribunal. Always tell the tribunal if the situation changes.
What happens at a rent repayment order tribunal hearing?
First-tier Tribunal hearings for housing cases are less formal than court, but they are not casual conversations. A panel, usually one or two members, will have read your bundle in advance. They will ask you to summarise your case, then ask the landlord to respond, then ask both sides questions.
Prepare a short oral summary of the offence, the period, the rent paid, and the amount you are claiming. Two minutes, not ten. The panel already has the documents.
Anticipate the landlord's defence. In licensing cases, common defences run along three lines. They applied for a licence and it was pending. They did not know licensing applied to the property. You were not their tenant or licensee (for offences from 1 May 2026, a superior landlord can also be liable). Research each of these in advance and know how to respond.
If the landlord does not attend, the hearing usually proceeds in their absence. The tribunal will still require you to prove your case.
You are allowed to bring a representative. Remedy is not a law firm and may not be able to represent you at the tribunal itself.
For a full walkthrough of the application process before you get to the hearing, see how to apply for a Rent Repayment Order in the UK.
If your landlord was unlicensed while you were paying rent, Remedy can check the council register against your address and help you turn your rent records into a tribunal-ready bundle.
