All Docs
FeaturesDepositClearUpdated March 14, 2026

Deposit Protection Deadline Escalation (Day 25 Warning)

Deposit Protection Deadline Escalation (Day 25 Warning)

Introduced in: v0.1.326

Overview

The platform automatically monitors all active tenancies for unregistered deposits and sends a CRITICAL escalation alert when the 30-day statutory registration deadline is five days away. This gives org admins a clear, time-bounded window to act before a Housing Act 2004 penalty becomes a real risk.

How It Works

Schedule

The workflow runs once per day at 07:30 UTC via a cron trigger (30 7 * * *). There is no manual trigger — it fires automatically every morning.

Detection Logic

Every run queries all active tenancies and flags records that match all three of the following conditions:

depositAmount > 0
AND (depositScheme = 'none' OR depositProtectionRef IS NULL)
AND (startDate + 25 days) <= TODAY < (startDate + 30 days)
ConditionPurpose
depositAmount > 0Confirms a deposit was collected — no-deposit tenancies are excluded
depositScheme = 'none' or depositProtectionRef IS NULLConfirms no scheme has been registered via the platform
Day 25–29 windowTargets the critical 5-day run-up before the 30-day legal deadline

Notifications Sent

For each flagged tenancy, the workflow sends:

  1. In-app notification (CRITICAL priority) to all org admins
  2. Email alert to all org admins

Both carry the message:

*"5 days to register deposit protection — Housing Act 2004 penalty up to 3× deposit."

A record is also written to the reminderLog entity so the same tenancy is not re-alerted within the same day's run.

Who Receives Alerts

Alerts are sent to org admins — members of the organisation associated with the tenancy who hold an admin-level role in orgMembers. Individual agents or landlords do not receive this specific escalation directly; org admins are expected to route action as needed.

Compliance Background

The Housing Act 2004 (sections 213–215) requires that any deposit taken for an Assured Shorthold Tenancy in England or Wales is protected in a government-approved scheme within 30 days of receipt.

Failure to comply carries the following consequences:

  • A court may order the landlord/agent to pay the tenant 1× to 3× the deposit amount as a penalty
  • The landlord loses the ability to serve a valid Section 21 (no-fault eviction) notice until the deposit is protected or returned
  • This is also relevant under the Renters' Rights Act, which increases scrutiny of deposit handling

Resolving an Alert

To clear the escalation, an org admin should:

  1. Navigate to the flagged tenancy in the platform
  2. Register the deposit with a government-approved scheme (e.g. DPS, MyDeposits, TDS)
  3. Update the tenancy record with the deposit scheme name and protection reference number
  4. Confirm the depositProtectionRef field is populated — this will exclude the tenancy from future runs

Once depositScheme and depositProtectionRef are correctly set, the tenancy will no longer be flagged by this workflow.

Related Workflows

  • Day 1 Deposit Reminder — initial prompt to register protection at tenancy start
  • Day 14 Deposit Warning — mid-period reminder for tenancies still unprotected
  • Day 30 Deposit Breach Alert — post-deadline escalation if protection is still absent after 30 days