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Question Title: Email notice
| Question: 398 |
| Is it possible to serve a Section 21 notice by email ?
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| Answer: |
| In short, it is possible, but serving the notice by the traditional method (either by post, or in person at the address) is still probably the best solution. The Electronic Communications Act 2000 now makes legal provision for electronic signatures and there is equivalent legislation to support electronic conveyancing so the law is quickly adapting to all this new communications technology. That said, there are still sufficient technical hurdles to be overcome before the law becomes comfortable with email delivery of important legal notices. Email delivery is not yet failsafe; emails and attachments can be blocked by spam filters, be accidentally deleted, or occasionally, emails simply fail to arrive. In addition, a recipient can fail to check or even be aware that mail has arrived for several days (especially if the computer is broken or infected with a virus). Equally, users can easily change their email address without notification so that the mail is never retrieved by the recipient. Until these issues are resolved and specific legislation invoked, we can only rely on common law principles which suggest that a landlord would need a written agreement from the tenant that notices could be served on the recipient in this manner. Even with this agreement, it is unlikely that the sender could rely on this method of service as 'sufficient' service; i.e. unlike registered post, it would be hard to prove service and the recipient could easily deny receiving the notice simply by stating that his computer was broken at the time when the notice was likely to be received.
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References:
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Pages:
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Hyperlinks:
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Letting Handbook |
Chapter 12 |
letting-handbook-and-factsheets.html
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Letting Factsheet No 21 |
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factsheet-21
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For more information, discuss on the Forum
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