u/potiondlight

Hi all,

I am in a joint tenancy with my current flatmate since 2 years ago. I was assigned to take the share of the tenancy when the previous person moved out. So we have done the assignation before with the same letting agency, that was how I got onto the current rolling tenancy that my current flatmate was already in. (UK)

So, my current flatmate recently submitted notice to landlord and agency that he's moving out by end of month. And I have confirmed with landlord that I'm staying and I will find a replacement flatmate. The landlord is cool with it and has agreed in text that if I found a person, he's happy with going ahead with assignation. I have also sent letting agency that I am staying, and the arrangement that the landlord, the current flatmate who's moving out, and I all agreed and happy to do assignation when I found a person to take up the share.

The agency sent an email, saying that my flatmate stating his intention to leave means starting a new tenancy protocol. (Despite we had explicitly say this is going to be an assignation)

In my exisiting lease terms, it's stated

• Assignation: Where a Tenant transfers his or her rights to a private residential tenancy (or share in a joint tenancy) to another person, subject to obtaining the Landlord’s prior written permission.

However, the letting agency sent an email saying that,

"Assignation is the process of assigning a new tenant to the current lease. We don't provide reference checks and the previous tenant will be on the new lease. Tenancy changeover, includes a new private tenancy agreement and referencing is carried out  for any incoming tenant.  For clarity, assignation is purely for short term absences in a property, for instance a 3 month holiday, to temporally find someone to cover the rental payments. Not for long term tenancies. I understand there has been some confusion in terminology and since your last lease was done. "

I intend to stay and Iandlord is happy about it. I have no intention to submit any notice, but what the agency is saying is that I'm going to be pushed into signing a brand new tenancy/PRT? Do they have legal basis to refuse assignation to be done in this scenario?

I'm close to getting a replacement flatmate to request assignation to be done soon and I'm worried how it impacts me to be forced into a new tenancy. Thanks for reading, and appreciate input from whoever got experience or expert knowledge.