I was contacted recently by a Landlord Law member who had a few questions about my recommended procedure for landlords to follow to protect their position with tenancy deposits.
She is going to re-serve all her tenants with the prescribed information (a good idea) so she is able to prove, if challenged, that this has been done.
But, she asked me, should she also include a data protection notice requesting consent to store information on her PC? Then she asked, should she be registered for Data Protection?
Should you register?
Although I am not a Date Protection expert, I think the answer is probably ‘yes’. The Data Protection Act is rather wide and if you store any information on a computer you are subject to its provisions.
The Independent Commissionser’s Office (ICO) does actually have a special page with information for landlords. Strangely though, it does not seem to cover the question of actual registration with them.
Checking on the ICO website
There is a little trail you can follow to find out if you need to register which starts here. The most important page is probably quesiton 4 which lists the activities which are not exempt. This includes ‘property management’ (which sounds like being a landlord to me) and also ‘accounts and records’ where the information has been obtained from a credit reference agency.
Registering with the ICO is not a problem though. I have been registered with them for years. The main impact it wil have on your life is that you will have to pay them a modest £35 per year.
The ICO helpline
If you have any questions there is a helpline you can use on 0303 123 1113.
I spoke to them recently about amending my records to include the education category in view of my new School for Landlords site and forthcoming Easy Law Training course and I found them very helpful and pleasant.
Generally my view is that it is best to register as then you will avoid any problems.
Tim Musson says
April 20, 2012 at 12:49 PMI don’t know this sector in detail, but I suspect that the term landlord covers a huge range of individuals/organisations. The
ICO website (www.ico.gov.uk)has a notification template for property management – I suggest a landlord starts to go through the notification process, looks at the template and decides if the information and purposes in it match their collection and purposes for personal data. If it does then they certainly ought to notify. If not then they may well not need to and can just exit the process.
Tessa Shepperson says
April 20, 2012 at 12:51 PMThanks Tim, thats really helpful.
Simon Goldburn says
April 30, 2012 at 9:15 AMIt is worth stressing that even if you are not required to notify the Information Commissioner’s Office, you must still comply with the rest of the Data Protection Act. For example, if you hold personal information on a laptop that is not encrypted, you could face a penalty of up to £500,000. You must also give the information you would have given on notification to anyone who requests it in writing, within 21 days, so it may be easier to notify voluntarily.