No hearing. No visit. Just the documents you sent.
Deposit adjudication is the purest documents-only process in English law. The adjudicator does not hold a hearing and does not visit the property. It is decided on the papers, and while a scheme may occasionally chase a critical document that was left out, you should not count on being asked. They read what both sides submitted inside the filing window and decide on the balance of probabilities, normally within about a month. Whatever you failed to preserve simply does not exist.
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Tenancy deposit adjudication is decided on the evidence sent to the scheme, and on nothing else. There is no hearing and no inspection of the property. Each scheme sets its own windows, typically around ten working days or a fortnight for each side to submit an evidence pack, with a decision following within roughly a month. Check the timetable of the scheme holding your deposit rather than assuming, because the three schemes differ. The standard of proof is the balance of probabilities: the adjudicator asks whether it is more likely than not that the claimed loss is attributable to the tenant. In England and Wales deposits are held by one of three government-approved schemes: the Deposit Protection Service, the Tenancy Deposit Scheme and mydeposits. Scotland has its own three schemes with a 30 working day protection deadline, and Northern Ireland has two with 28 days, so check the rules where the property is. Because nobody will ask you a question, the quality of what you file is the whole case. ProofSnap captures the original listing, the inventory, the condition report, the agent thread and any repair request as a package containing the full page, the saved source, the URL, the UTC capture time, a SHA-256 hash of every file, an RSA-4096 signature and an eIDAS qualified timestamp that carries the Article 41 presumption under retained UK law. From $4.99 (about £3.90) as a one-off.
By Radim Motycka, Founder and Lead Engineer, ProofSnap · · Independently verifiable via Trust Verifier
How these disputes are actually decided
You do not get to explain. You only get to file.
Every instinct from a courtroom is wrong here. Nobody hears you, nobody visits, and there is no second chance after the deadline.
The listing no longer says what it said
Rental listings are edited constantly: white goods included, garden maintained, carpets new. When the listing that made you sign is gone, you are describing it from memory while the agent describes it differently, and the adjudicator sees only the descriptions.
The repair thread gets tidied up
Agents change and portals archive. The repair you chased four times becomes a repair nobody remembers being asked about, and an undocumented request is indistinguishable from one that never happened.
The filing window closes fast
Each side gets a short filing window, measured in working days rather than weeks. Time spent hunting for evidence you no longer have comes straight out of it, and late material is simply not before the adjudicator.
What the process actually looks like
All three approved schemes run a similar adjudication. The details differ slightly, so check the rules of the scheme holding your deposit.
Documents only, no hearing
The adjudicator decides on the evidence sent to the scheme. There is no hearing and no visit to the property. That is faster and cheaper than court, and it means an argument you did not put in writing is an argument you did not make.
A filing window each way
Each scheme sets its own timetable, typically around ten working days or a fortnight for each side to file an evidence pack, with a decision following within roughly a month. The three schemes differ, so work to the timetable of the one holding your deposit.
Three approved schemes
The Deposit Protection Service, the Tenancy Deposit Scheme and mydeposits, for England and Wales. Since the Renters Rights Act 2025 took effect on 1 May 2026 assured shorthold tenancies have been abolished, so the deposit rules now attach to assured tenancies. Scotland and Northern Ireland run separate schemes with different deadlines.
Time limits after the tenancy ends
Limits differ by scheme and by route within the same scheme. The insured routes run to a deadline measured from the end of the tenancy, roughly three months or 90 days depending on the scheme, while the custodial routes have no fixed calendar deadline and run on response windows instead. Raise it promptly rather than assuming the door stays open. If adjudication is not available you are left with the county court, where the same documents matter more, not less.
What actually wins a deposit adjudication
Adjudicators decide on the gap between the check-in and the check-out, judged against fair wear and tear, and reasonable wear and tear is not usually a valid deduction. A landlord without a signed inventory has significant difficulty justifying any deduction at all, and where a landlord files nothing the adjudicator decides on what is in front of them, which often means the deposit returns to the tenant in full. That means the strongest file is the pairing: the inventory and photographs at the start, the same rooms at the end, the original listing showing what was promised, and the thread showing what was reported and when. Capture the listing on the day you sign, not on the day the dispute starts, because by then it will have changed. Landlords should do exactly the same for exactly the same reason.
Three steps, about forty seconds
No forensic training required. The proof is in the package, not in your testimony about how careful you were.
Capture while it is live
Open the listing, the portal message or the inventory and capture it. The full page is saved, including the parts below the fold that a phone screenshot would cut off.
Everything is hashed and timestamped
SHA-256 for every file, an RSA-4096 signature over the manifest, an eIDAS qualified timestamp and a Bitcoin blockchain anchor, so the date cannot be moved afterwards.
File inside your window
Attach the PDF evidence report to your submission, in room-by-room order with every photograph labelled. The adjudicator gets a document that reads cleanly and that the other side can verify independently.
What lands in the evidence package
Between 11 and 15 files depending on your plan, delivered as one ZIP that anyone can check without installing anything.
Full-page screenshot
The whole page, not just the visible window, stitched and hashed.
Saved page source
The document as rendered at capture time, including the head, meta tags and structured data.
Extracted page text
Searchable plain text, so a quote can be found and cited without retyping.
Technical metadata
URL, page title, HTTP response headers, browser, operating system and the capture time in UTC.
Signed manifest
SHA-256 for every file, signed with an RSA-4096 key whose public key ships in the package.
Blockchain timestamp
The manifest hash anchored to Bitcoin via OpenTimestamps, so the capture time cannot be backdated.
Chain of custody and forensic log
A record of what happened during the capture, in the order it happened.
Evidence report as PDF
A readable summary you can attach to an application, a notice or a report.
Verification instructions
Written steps plus scripts, so the other side can re-check the hashes offline.
Anyone can verify it, including the other side. Drop the ZIP onto the public Trust Verifier and the hashes, the signature and the timestamp are checked in the browser. Nothing is uploaded and nothing depends on ProofSnap still existing.
Three ways to get the evidence
Prices are charged in USD. Approximate sterling figures are shown for orientation only, and your card issuer sets the actual rate.
One dispute
$4.99 once
about £4
A SnapPack is a single up-front purchase for a set number of captures. No subscription, no auto-renewal, no trial. Best when you have one problem and you want it documented today.
Get a SnapPackOngoing matters
$8.99/month
about £7
For anyone who captures regularly: practitioners, property managers, HR, investigators. The 7-day free trial requires a credit card. Cancel any time during the trial and you are not charged.
Start the 7-day trialWe do it for you
$44.99 per URL
about £34
Send us the link and our team captures the package for you, with nothing to install. Useful when the capture should not come from a party to the dispute.
See the capture serviceProofSnap is not a law firm and does not give legal advice. This reflects the position as at 30 July 2026. Recognition of EU qualified status in the UK rests on Article 24A of the assimilated eIDAS Regulation, and section 131 of the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 contains a power to narrow it which has not been brought into force. Qualified timestamps are issued by Disig a.s., a Qualified Trust Service Provider on the EU Trusted List. The United Kingdom retained the trust services chapter of eIDAS in domestic law and recognises EU qualified providers, so that timestamp carries the Article 41 presumption here.
Official sources
Every figure and deadline on this page comes from the following primary sources. Check them yourself rather than taking our word for it.
- GOV.UK: tenancy deposit protection which deposits must be protected and how the schemes work.
- Deposit Protection Service one of the three approved schemes and its dispute process.
- Tenancy Deposit Scheme adjudication timescales and what evidence to submit.
- mydeposits the third approved scheme, with its own dispute rules.
Presentation matters as much as the capture. Label every document, put the check-in and check-out side by side, and explain in plain words what each file is meant to show. An adjudicator reading a tidy bundle decides on the merits. An adjudicator reading a pile of undated screenshots decides on whatever else is in front of them.
Questions people actually ask
The adjudicator sees your documents and nothing else
Capture the listing on the day you sign. It will not say the same thing when the dispute starts.