Landlord ordered to pay €15,000 to former tenant over HAP refusal
Seán McCárthaigh
A landlord has been ordered to pay €15,000 compensation to a former tenant who was made homeless after he refused to sign documents to allow him to obtain the Housing Assistance Payment.
The Workplace Relations Commission ruled that Stephen Vincent had discriminated against his tenant, Aurimas Evstifejevas, in breach of the Equal Status Act 2000, over his refusal to fill out the necessary paperwork to get paid the HAP.
Vincent had separately been ordered to pay a total of €17,463 in compensation to Evstifejevas last year by a Residential Tenancies Board tribunal over his tenancy of a rental property in Harold’s Cross, Dublin.
The WRC heard that Evstifejevas was a tenant of Vincent from 2021 until he was evicted in July 2024 after missing rent payments for his rental property.
Evstifejevas claimed he had suffered significant financial loss as a result of the landlord refusing to sign his HAP forms despite him being eligible to avail of the support payment.
He estimated he had missed out on €27,000 in rent subsidies due to the landlord’s refusal to accept HAP payments.
Vincent did not attend a WRC hearing of the case last March.
However, the landlord subsequently contacted the WRC seeking further information.
Although the WRC offered Vincent the opportunity to request a resumed hearing, he did not replay to the tribunal.
Evstifejevas, who provided video evidence of posting a HAP form through his landlord’s door in May 2024, also told the WRC that he suspected his rental property did not meet the minimum standards for tenancies.
He gave evidence that he was served with a notice of termination on July 14th, 2024, and told to leave the property within five days.
Mr Evstifejevas said two men arrived on July 23rd, 2024, and threw his possessions outside on the street.
He told the WRC that he was homeless for two months during which time he had lived in a tent for a period.
WRC adjudication officer, David James Murphy, said he believed the maximum permitted award of €15,000 was appropriate in the case given the tenant’s uncontested evidence.
In a separate ruling last October, the Residential Tenancies Board tribunal ordered Vincent and fellow landlord, Susan O’Brien, to pay a total of €17,463 in compensation to Evstifejevas.
The tribunal fully rejected an appeal by the couple against findings by an RTB adjudicator who had made a similar award in favour of the tenant.
The adjudicator had also upheld a complaint by Evstifejevas that he was not allowed to enjoy peaceful and exclusive occupation of the property.
The award consisted of €12,000 in damages for the unlawful termination of Evstifejevas’ tenancy of the apartment which is attached to the landlords’ own home at Samba House, Mountain View Avenue, Harold’s Cross.
The tribunal also directed the landlords to pay their former tenant €5,000 in compensation for breaching their obligations in relation to the standard and maintenance of the dwelling as well as a further €463 as the balance of an unjustifiably retained security deposit.
Evstifejevas gave evidence to the RTB tribunal that the landlord cut off his electricity, water and wi-fi and removed his bed and front door after serving him with a notice of termination in July 2024.
He also claimed the landlord had illegally entered his property on 18 occasions.
The landlords’ legal representative claim that the RTB had no jurisdiction in the case as Vincent lived in the same house was rejected by the tribunal as there were no shared facilities and both dwellings had separate entrances.
The barrister also maintained that the tenant had not complied with his obligations to allow the landlord reasonable access to the dwelling as well as leaving the oven on for sustained periods and food on the floor which posed a fire and hygiene hazard.
The RTB tribunal chairperson, Ciara Doyle, said the landlord’s actions were “wilful and deliberate and designed to wrongly interfere with the tenant’s right to peaceful and exclusive occupation of the dwelling.”
While Doyle acknowledged had Vincent a genuine concern over the tenant’s behaviour in covering the dwelling in tin foil, leaving the heat and electrics on and failing to properly dispose of waste, she said it did not justify his actions including ultimately illegally evicting Evstifejevas.
She remarked that the way he had been treated by the landlord was “very poor.”
Doyle said it was also clear from a report from Dublin City Council in May 2024 that there were “many flagrant breaches” of minimum standards.
The tribunal also accepted the tenant’s evidence that he had alerted the landlord to wooden panels falling off the walls as well as a bathroom door coming off but nothing was done.
Doyle said Vincent had interfered with services to the dwelling to expedite the end of the tenancy as well as acting in a manner in breach of his legal obligations as a landlord.
