Q&A - Unreasonable service charges pursuant to the Limitation Act 1980

Recovery of unreasonable service charges pursuant to the Limitation Act 1980, it is an aspect of leasehold management that has wide implications for the individual lessee and for the landlord, yet I believe it has eluded most leaseholders, and it is one that I think few landlords wish to acknowledge, let alone observe, if they can possibly avoid it.

Our attention was drawn to it following an LVT Determination covering 9 years of overpaid rents on the House Manager’s apartment, but the landlord decided to ignore 3 of those 9 years of refunds awarded to the leaseholders - accepting only 6 years of overcharges as his extent of liability.  That may be the limit in the case of simple contracts, but not for those expressed in an instrument under seal as are thousands of long term leases.  We are still trying to recover the balance of that award, 20 months after the LVT Hearing.