I moved out of the property I rented at the end of June. Same day I asked for my deposit back. Letting agency returned with the End Of Tenancy Report listing all defects they found on the 7th of July. I was in the process of moving abroad at that time (to say Covid complicated things a bit would be an understatement of epic proportions), so I missed their reply. I also forgot about it: my sickness, my wife's pregnancy, stresses with moving and Covid etc - i remembered about it in November. So i checked my emails and found the reply. I contested their findings (they attached quote for renovation of the whole property to the tune of GBP 5000, nearly quadruple of the deposit of GBP 1500, and I could not make out what exactly it said), made my offer of what I would pay to cover the costs and I waited for reply. They came back today and they said that I forfeited the deposit as I failed to reply within the statutory period of 3 months.
I can't find that requirement anywhere in the online resources I could find. I mean - nowhere it says there is a time limit for negotiations. No matter wher I look. No page, including .gov site, has a link to the law, so maybe it's in some obscure section of some act or something? I seem to fail to find it in the actual law that pertains to (The Housing Act??? Not sure of even that).
Is this time limit the actual case or am I being scammed out of my deposit? They tried already - I ended the rent agreement early because they failed to maintain property and they tried to condition their agreement to early termination on my forfeiting the deposit. I refused, and later found out their demand was flat out illegal. So I would not be surprised.
Deposit was held under the TDS scheme and I have the relevant paperwork.