Wales Deposit Protection 30-Day Deadline: How the Clock Works

The Dual Obligation Inside 30 Days

Section 45(2) of the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 sets a 30-calendar-day window that starts on the day the deposit is paid. Within that window, the landlord must complete two separate duties:

1. Comply with the initial requirements of an authorised deposit scheme — register the deposit with DPS, MyDeposits, or TDS
2. Serve the required information on the contract-holder (and any third party who paid on their behalf) — the full information pack specified by the Renting Homes (Deposit Schemes) (Required Information) (Wales) Regulations 2022

Both duties must be finished within the same 30 days. Completing one without the other still counts as non-compliance.

Counting the Days

Day 1 is the day the deposit is received. If a contract-holder pays a £1,000 security deposit by bank transfer on 5 January, that is Day 1. Day 30 is 3 February. The deadline expires at midnight on Day 30.

Weekends and bank holidays do not extend the deadline. Civil procedure rules about working days apply to court filings, not to substantive statutory deadlines under Welsh housing legislation. If Day 30 falls on a Sunday or a public holiday, the landlord must still have completed both steps by that date.

Agent Receipt Counts as Landlord Receipt

When a letting agent collects the deposit on the landlord's behalf, the 30-day clock starts on the date the agent receives the money — not when the agent forwards it to the landlord. This is a frequent trap for landlords who use agents for tenant-finding only. If the agent holds the deposit for two weeks before transferring it, the landlord has already lost half the compliance window.

Instalment Payments

If a landlord agrees to let the contract-holder pay the security deposit in instalments, each instalment triggers its own independent 30-day clock. A deposit paid as £500 on 1 March and £500 on 1 April means two separate deadlines: 30 March and 30 April. The landlord must protect each portion and serve updated required information reflecting the new total within each respective window.

What Happens When You Miss It

Missing the deadline triggers two consequences that operate independently:

Penalty exposure: The contract-holder can apply to the County Court for a compensation order of between 1x and 3x the deposit amount. The court must make the order if it finds non-compliance — there is no judicial discretion to dismiss.

Section 173 block: Under Section 177, the landlord cannot serve a valid no-fault possession notice while the deposit remains non-compliant. Late protection does not cure the breach. The route to restore the right to serve notice is returning the deposit in full, or the remaining balance after agreed deductions.

A Practical Timeline

For a deposit received on Day 1, a realistic compliance schedule looks like this:

• Day 1–3: Register the deposit with your chosen authorised scheme
• Day 3–7: Populate the scheme's required information form with all fields specified in S.I. 2022/250 (scheme details, property address, deposit amount, landlord and contract-holder contact details, deduction terms, repayment procedures)
• Day 7–10: Serve the required information on the contract-holder and any third-party payer, recording proof of delivery
• Day 10–30: Buffer for postal delays, signature returns, or corrections

Front-loading the work to the first ten days leaves a comfortable margin. The Wales deposit protection guide includes a day-by-day compliance sequence and a proof-of-service log to track each step against the statutory deadline.

See more Wales guides →