I can't find anything on TDS regarding this (and have never come across them before) so hopefully someone here with more experience knows the answer. Our rental contract was coming to an end and we found a new rental house to move to. Unfortunately, the new house fell through. An alternative rental house was found but we couldn't move in until a week after our previous rental contract would have expired (leaving us homeless for a week). So we asked our landlord if we could stay an extra week and pay him the same rental rate that we always had, for that extra week. He agreed. I didn't really think about the fact that there was no formal tenancy agreement/contract for that extra week. Or that we hadn't involved the lettings agency. The landlord managed the property and the rent always went straight to him. A lettings agency had set up the original contract a year before. We made all this agreement through email. We are now having a dispute with the landlord over the tenancy deposit (despite the property being in immaculate condition and professionally cleaned top to bottom when we left with receipts to prove it). We have tried to reach an agreement over the last three weeks but he is being totally unreasonable and uncontactable and I think arbitration is the only way to go now. The deposit was protected by the TDS. However, when I looked at raising a dispute, it said we could only do this if the deposit was protected when we vacated the property. If our formal tenancy agreement had run out, does that mean that our deposit was not protected when we left? Perhaps I'm being paranoid but does that stop us being able to open a dispute with the TDS?

We agreed the move in date on the 3rd March and signed the contract the next day, along with paying the holding deposit.

Sure. When we agreed the cost of the rental, we put in an offer of monthly rent and move in date. At that point it was agreed that 18th April would be the move in date that the landlord wanted and we agreed to. It was all verbal agreement. We then booked everything (removals, utility switchover etc) for that date. Does that answer the question?

Thanks for your reply. The contract was signed on 3rd March 2011 with a view to a move in date of 18th April 2011. Apologies for overloading you with detail but here is the contract for the holding deposit. This is the only contract that we had with them because no tenancy agreement was seen by us or signed. It says - "Thank you for your payment of £480 by way of a holding deposit to indicate your good faith and serious intentions to proceed with renting the above property. This will be held against our expenses in processing your application and if your application is successful will be deducted from your initial monies. It is important to note that this payment does not oblige our client to let the above property or any other property to you and does not commit the landlord to granting a tenancy or constitute an offer of a tenancy. You have agreed, as acceptance of your offer that your move in date is to be confirmed as (subject to contract). However, should it be necessary to alter the tenancy dates due to any change or delay in your circumstances after the tenancy agreement has been prepared, it will be necessary to charge additional preparation costs up to a maximum of £58.75. Please note if the tenancy agreement does not proceed due to any of the following circumstances there will be a charge to cover any reasonable costs up to a maximum of the full deposit. - Where you change your mind and withdraw after references have been sought and/or documents prepared and/or preparations for the tenancy put in hand - Where the tenancy does not start within one calendar month of the signature of this agreement because of any action by you - Where your references are incorrect or misleading We will refund your money in full if the landlord decides to withdraw for any reason or is unable to enter into the tenancy"

My only worry is that the holding deposit contract we signed does not include the agreed date. It simply says "As per tenancy contract" and we didn't have a tenancy agreement at that stage. We do have email communications from us to the agency with the agreed date mentioned on them, before it all fell through. That is the only mention of the agreed date though and everything was done over the phone. Does that change anything?

We agreed to rent a house with a £500 holding deposit based on moving in on a certain date. Just days before the move in date, we called the agency to check all was ok and were told that there was a serious problem. The previous tenants had refused to leave and court papers had been served to get them evicted. This meant that we weren't able to move in. We tried to come to a compromise with the agency about a new date but they were useless at keeping us informed about the progress of the court case and they kept moving the move in date further and further back. As the end of our previous tenancy agreement was very close, we had no choice but to find another property with another agent. The first agent have refused to provide us with our holding deposit back, despite the fact that, through no fault of our own, the tenancy was unable to proceed. Are they right in being able to keep our £500?? Thinking about small claims but I'm not sure how strong the case would be. Help!