Housing benefit information for landlords

We believe that landlords are important stakeholders in the service that we provide. We aim to work with landlords to make sure that they receive payment promptly.

In return, we ask landlords to respect our obligations towards claimant confidentially and the rules regarding the disclosure of information to a third party when they make enquiries about their tenants.

Landlord portal

The landlord portal allows you to access information about your tenant’s housing benefit claim, if the payments are made directly to you.

To access the landlord portal you need to fill in an online declaration.

Apply for access to the landlord portal

Following your registration we will email you with all the details you need to start using the landlord portal.

Once your account has been set up, you will be able to:

• check payments - giving you a breakdown of payments received for each of your tenants that you receive housing benefit directly - you can also download this to excel
• view individual cases (where payment is made to you) - such as the amount of entitlement, the amount and date of the next payment due, and the amount of any overpayment clawback
• report a change in your tenant’s circumstance - this can be done on the landlord portal and will help us to reduce overpayments made to your tenant

Private tenants and safeguarding

For private tenants who we make local housing allowance payments to, we would normally only make payments direct to the tenant.

However safeguards can be put in place to protect the vulnerable and in certain cases we can pay tenants’ housing benefit entitlement directly to landlords.

Fill in the safeguard application form to request this. Any request for payment to a landlord needs to be supported by evidence from a third party.

If your tenant is in arrears by 8 weeks or more

Benefit can still be paid to a landlord if a tenant falls into arrears of 8 weeks or more. Written proof of arrears will be required and so landlords should make sure they keep detailed records of the rent account.

Housing Association tenants or private tenancies with claims prior to 7 April 2008

For Housing Association tenants, or for private tenants whose date of claim is prior to 7 April 2008, landlords need to fill in a direct payment of housing benefit to landlords form and return it to us in order to have rent paid directly.

Obligations of a landlord

If you accept direct payment from us you may be required to pay back the money if your tenant receives housing benefit to which they are not entitled.

A landlord also has a duty to inform us if a tenant for whom they are being paid benefit leaves their property.