Free tool
Which rules apply to your property, and what falls due next
The duties on a UK short let depend on where it is, what it is and how it is let. Answer six questions and the schedule narrows to the ones that are yours. Then keep the record here: what is done, who did it, and the date it comes round again.
Everywhere
A written fire risk assessment
Required for paying guest accommodation, with interlinked smoke and heat alarms sited room by room, and a carbon monoxide alarm where there is a gas or solid fuel-burning appliance. This is a higher standard than the domestic "alarm on every storey" rule.
No fixed interval in law
Upholstered furniture that meets fire safety regulations
Evidenced by the permanent sewn-in label. The card swing label stopped being a requirement on 30 October 2025, so second-hand buying turns on the permanent label.
No fixed interval in law
Electrical safety in line with HSE guidance
Typically evidenced by an Electrical Installation Condition Report. England’s electrical regulations are written for tenancies rather than holiday lets, but the duty to provide safe installations still applies.
Inspected and tested at least every five years
Insurance that covers short-let use
Buildings and public liability cover that names short letting. Standard home insurance generally excludes it, and Scotland’s licence conditions require both explicitly.
No fixed interval in law
Where you are
A short-term let licence, before your first booking
Scotland requires the licence to be in place before you take a booking, which makes it the first item on the timeline rather than a later one.
Licences usually last three years
Registration with the Welsh Revenue Authority
The register is open now and every provider must be on it by 31 March 2027. It is free, it catches anyone taking bookings of 31 nights or less, and an agent may register on the provider’s behalf while the duty stays with the provider. It is separate from the letting test that decides council tax against non-domestic rates.
The register is open now
England’s registration scheme: nothing to do yet
Required by law and still not live. There is nothing to register, nowhere to register, no fee and no published regulations. In September 2026 the Culture Secretary told the Commons it would be up and running in full “by March”, without saying which March.
No fixed interval in law
The 90-night rule
London sits on top of England’s rules: entire-home short letting beyond 90 nights in a calendar year needs planning permission for change of use.
No fixed interval in law
Whether a material change of use needs planning permission
There is no planning use class for short lets in England, so permission is needed only where letting amounts to a material change of use. That is a question of fact and degree decided by your council, and it is affected by Article 4 directions and, in Wales, by the C5 and C6 use classes.
No fixed interval in law
Planning permission: almost never, for a room in your own home
Letting a room while you go on living in the property sits at the far end of the fact and degree scale, because the use of the building has not meaningfully changed.
No fixed interval in law
Northern Ireland runs its own regime
The safety, insurance and tax duties above apply. The licensing, registration and rating rules do not travel from the other three nations, and the guides on this site do not yet cover the Northern Ireland regime, so treat its requirements as a separate check.
No fixed interval in law
Your property
An annual Gas Safety Record (CP12)
From a Gas Safe registered engineer, if there is any gas appliance in the property.
Annual
An Energy Performance Certificate
Required before the property is marketed. The exemption for buildings intended to be used less than four months of the year does not reach a property marketed all year. The minimum E rating does not apply to a genuine holiday let, and short-term lets are outside the EPC C standard confirmed for 2030, at this time.
Valid for ten years
An EPC, probably not, but write down why
A building intended to be used less than four months of the year falls inside the exemption. The test is the building’s intended use, so keep a note of the basis you are relying on. If the property sits near the line, ask a domestic energy assessor before deciding.
No fixed interval in law
An Energy Performance Certificate
Scotland’s regulations carry no four-month residential exemption, so the England and Wales answer does not travel. Assume one is needed and check alongside the licence.
Valid for ten years
The lease clause that decides it is the user covenant
Owners search a lease for "sublet", find a qualified alienation covenant and stop there. The clause that usually settles short letting is the user covenant, which controls what the flat is used for and never mentions letting at all.
No fixed interval in law
Consent to let from your lender
Short letting usually falls outside the terms of both a residential and a standard buy-to-let mortgage, so it needs permission in writing rather than assumption.
No fixed interval in law
Money
Council tax or business rates: the 140 and 70 night test
An English self-catering property moves to the business rates list when it was available to let commercially for 140 nights and actually let for 70 nights in the same 12 months, with the intention to make it available for 140 in the next 12.
No fixed interval in law
Council tax or non-domestic rates: the 252 and 182 day test
Wales runs a harder test than England: available to let for at least 252 days a year and actually let for at least 182 of them.
No fixed interval in law
Declaring the income on Self Assessment
Short-let profits go on the SA105 UK property pages. Register by 5 October after the tax year and file by 31 January. The furnished holiday lettings regime ended on 6 April 2025, which changed four things on the return.
Every tax year
Watching the VAT threshold
Short-let income is standard-rated, and the threshold follows the person rather than the property, so two properties are added together.
No fixed interval in law
The Rent a Room scheme may apply
Letting furnished space inside your own main home can use the £7,500 Rent a Room allowance, which halves to £3,750 where the income is shared. It does not cover a whole-property holiday let.
No fixed interval in law
How the answers change the list
Four of the duties above apply to every UK short let regardless of anything else: a written fire risk assessment with interlinked alarms, furniture that meets fire safety regulations, safe electrics, and insurance that actually names short letting. Everything else turns on one of five facts.
- The nation. Scotland needs a licence before the first booking and has no four-month EPC exemption. Wales's Welsh Revenue Authority register is open now with a 31 March 2027 deadline, and it runs a 252 and 182 day letting test. England has a registration scheme that is legislated for but not live, and a 140 and 70 night test. Northern Ireland runs its own regime.
- Greater London. The 90-night rule sits on top of England's rules.
- Whole property or a room in your home. This moves more than people expect. Rent a Room reaches only the room, and only up to £7,500, halving to £3,750 where the income is shared. The rates tests, the EPC question and London's cap all run the other way: they are about a separately let unit, so a room inside your own occupied home sits outside them, and planning permission almost never arises.
- All year or under four months. This is what decides the EPC question in England and Wales, and the test is the building's intended use rather than the letting arrangement.
- Leasehold, mortgaged, or gas. Each adds a permission or a certificate: the user covenant in the lease, consent to let from the lender, and an annual Gas Safety Record.
Which duties come round again, and when
Four of them have an interval set by law or by the certificate itself, and those are the four the tool works out for you once you enter the date it was last done.
- The Gas Safety Record is annual. It is the one most likely to lapse unnoticed, because it falls due in the same quiet week every year.
- The electrical installation is inspected and tested at least every five years.
- An EPC is valid for ten years, which makes it the cheapest item on the list to stop thinking about.
- A Scottish short-term let licence usually lasts three years.
- Wales has a one-off deadline rather than an interval: the register is open now and closes on 31 March 2027.
Everything else has no fixed period in law. A fire risk assessment is kept under review rather than renewed on a date, and an insurance policy runs for whatever term the policy says. For those the tool takes a review date you set yourself and claims no interval of its own.
Nothing here is legal advice. Every duty links to a guide carrying its own sources and the date it was last checked. Planning and leasehold in particular turn on facts only your own documents and your council can settle, and nothing on this page replaces reading them.
Frequently asked questions
- Is this a legal checklist I can rely on?
- No. It is a map of the duties that commonly apply to a UK short let. It takes no view on your specific property, and the planning and leasehold questions in particular turn on facts only your documents and your council can settle.
- Where is my record saved?
- In your own browser, on the device you are using. There is no account and nothing is sent to us, so your record will not follow you to another device, and clearing your browsing data clears it. Use the copy button to keep a copy elsewhere.
- Why do only some duties have a renewal date?
- Because only some of them have one. A gas safety check is annual, an electrical installation is inspected at least every five years, an EPC lasts ten years, and a Scottish licence usually lasts three. The rest have no fixed interval in law, so the tool asks you to set your own review date rather than inventing a period.
- Why does Scotland get a different answer on EPCs?
- Because the four-month exemption sits in the England and Wales regulations. Scotland has its own, and they carry no equivalent residential exemption, so a Scottish holiday let cannot rely on the England and Wales position.
- What decides whether I pay council tax or business rates?
- A night-count test, and the two nations set it differently. England uses 140 nights available and 70 nights actually let. Wales uses 252 days available and 182 actually let. Both are tested over the same 12 months.
- Does this cover everything?
- No. It covers the duties the guides on this site establish and source. A TV licence, music licensing where music is played, and any condition specific to your council, your lease or your insurer sit outside it.
The list is the easy half
Keeping the dates is quicker than chasing them, and most owners discover the gap somewhere between the lease and the insurer. A free valuation starts with whether the property should be a short let at all, with the assumptions written down.
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