Gas safety certificates: the deadline that never stops
If your rental has any gas appliance, the annual gas safety check is the one deadline with no soft edges: it recurs every 12 months, forever, per property. This guide covers the cycle, the paperwork, and the penalty exposure.
The rule
Every gas appliance and flue you provide must be checked by a Gas Safe registered engineer at least every 12 months, and you must keep the record (the CP12) for two years. Tenants get a copy within 28 days of the check, or before they move in for new tenancies.
Spotted something out of date? Tell us
What it costs to miss
Gas safety is enforced by the HSE as a criminal matter, not a civil-penalty one. Fines can be unlimited, and a lapsed certificate can also complicate possession proceedings and insurance claims.
Spotted something out of date? Tell us
The trap: the renewal window
The practical failure mode isn't refusal — it's drift. An engineer visit slips a fortnight, then the next one anchors to the new date, and within a few years the certificate has quietly lapsed between tenancies. Anchoring reminders to the certificate's own expiry (rather than 'about a year since we last thought about it') is the whole game.