Landlord and tenant

Business premises - landlord terminating tenancy by notice sent recorded delivery - tenant applying for new tenant tenancy - time limit for application running from date of posting of notice

Beanby Estates Ltd v Egg Stores (Stamford Hill) Ltd: ChD (Mr Justice Neuberger): 9 May 2003

The tenant was in occupation of business premises and entitled to the protection under part II of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954.

On 7 January 2002 the landlord sent a notice under section 25 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 by recorded delivery to the tenant at the premises.

The notice was not actually received by the tenant until 9 January 2002.

The tenant applied to the county court for a new tenancy on 8 May 2002.

Under section 29(2) of the 1954 Act that application had to be made within four months of the service of the section 25 notice.

The landlord took the point that by section 23 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1927 the notice was served on 7 January, namely the date it was posted, and therefore the application was out of time.

The judge held that the notice was served on the date it was received and accordingly allowed the tenant's application.

The landlord appealed.

Siri Cope (instructed by Pothecary & Barrett) for the landlord; Marie-Claire Bleasdale (instructed by Bude Nathan Iwanier) for the tenant.

Held, allowing the appeal, that the effect of section 23 of the 1927 Act was that where a notice served under section 25 of the 1954 Act was sent through the post by recorded delivery to the addressee at his place of abode it was irrebuttably deemed to have been served; that, in those circumstances, service was deemed to have been made at the date that the notice was put in the post and not the date of actual receipt; and that, accordingly, the tenant's application was out of time.