In the UK landlords are able to evict tenants from their property without giving a reason, a fact that is increasingly being called out by housing charities and campaigners.

As the BBC’s Panorama programme highlighted recently, this means many tenants are vulnerable because a landlord can serve a Section 21 or ‘no fault’ eviction notice on them without explaining why.

More worryingly, recent figures show these kinds of evictions are gaining ground. And the government is under pressure from campaigners like housing Charity Shelter and lobbying group Generation Rent to do something about it.

But in some ways, they have already. In 2015 the Retaliatory Evictions and Deregulation Act came into force. It prevents a landlord from evicting a tenant if a legitimate complaint about the condition of a property has been raised by the tenant to them.

Once a complaint has been made, landlords have by law 14 days to response. They must set out what and when they intend to do about the problem, and carry out the repairs.

If nothing is done then the tenant must report the problem to the local authority. By doing this, they are then protected from being evicted in 'retaliation'.

Bad landlords

This legislation is designed to prevent landlords who, instead of addressing the problems a tenant is complaining about, evicts them using a Section 21 notice.

“Retaliatory eviction is an unacceptable practice and no tenant should fear becoming homeless because they have asked for a necessary repair,” the government said at the time.

This is how it works. If a tenant complains to a landlord about a leaking roof, for example, and nothing is subsequently done to repair it then the tenant should report the problem to their local council.

If the council agrees with the tenant then the landlord can be served with an improvement or emergency remedial action notice. The landlord then cannot evict the tenant for six months.

The kind of repairs covered by the legislation must be “a serious issue that might cause a potential risk of harm to the health or safety of the tenant, or a family member” such as water leaks or a faulty or broken heating system - but not a leaking tap or broken bulb.

Read more: Are tenant fees really being banned?

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If you want to improve your credit position by reporting your rent payments, CreditLadder is the only way to improve your credit score and position across all four of the main Credit Reference Agencies in the UK, namely Experian, Equifax, TransUnion and Crediva. Building up a high credit score has a lot of benefits, including helping you access finance at better rates - this can also help save you money.

CreditLadder also runs a free mortgage application service in partnership with Tembo which will tell you how much you could borrow.

Remember the information provided in this article is for information purposes only and should not be considered as advice.