Manchester City Council v Tabbasam: non-receipt of improvement notice can constitute reasonable excuse
A landlord who never received an improvement notice may have a reasonable excuse for non-compliance.
The Court of Appeal has dismissed Manchester City Council's appeal in Manchester City Council v Naila Tabbasam [2026] EWCA Civ 361, confirming that a landlord's failure to receive an improvement notice — even where service was technically valid — can constitute a reasonable excuse under s.30(4) of the Housing Act 2004.
The case arose after tenants at 58 Ollier Avenue complained to the Council about disrepair in March 2019. The Council checked the Land Registry, which showed Ms Tabbasam's address for service as the tenanted property itself. It also held a different address on council tax records. Neither was her actual home. The Council posted the improvement notice and subsequent correspondence to both addresses. Ms Tabbasam received none of it: the tenants did not forward the communications, and she had not lived at either address for some years. She remained unaware until July 2020, when a final enforcement reminder was sent to her actual address at Kedlestone Avenue.
The First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) found the offence proved. It rejected the reasonable excuse defence on the basis that Ms Tabbasam's failure to keep her Land Registry address current amounted to her own administrative fault, from which she could not benefit. A reduced penalty of £15,000 was imposed. On appeal, Upper Tribunal Judge Cooke allowed the appeal, finding the reasonable excuse defence was available. Manchester City Council appealed further, with permission granted on six grounds — all concerning whether the defence could survive where the notice was properly served under s.233 of the Local Government Act 1972.
Lord Justice Zacaroli, with whom Lord Justice Dove and Lady Justice Falk agreed, dismissed the appeal. The judgement addresses several important points of principle.
The FTT had relied on Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council v Tanna [2017] EWCA Civ 50 for the proposition that a landlord cannot rely on their own administrative failure to avoid liability. The Court of Appeal held that reliance was misplaced. Tanna concerned only the validity of service — specifically whether a former address qualified as a "last known address" under s.233 — and said nothing about the separate question of reasonable excuse. The FTT had treated a proposition about service as if it were a proposition about culpability.
The Court also rejected the Council's argument that the obligation to maintain an up-to-date address at the Land Registry is so fundamental that breach of it should preclude the defence as a matter of principle. Rule 198 of the Land Registration Rules 2003 requires a registered proprietor to provide an address for service, but does not require it to be a residential address. Providing the address of the let property was not in itself wrongful: Ms Tabbasam could reasonably have expected tenants to forward correspondence addressed to her. The immediate cause of non-receipt was the tenants' failure to do so.
Applying the framework in Perrin v HMRC [2018] UKUT 156 (TCC), as endorsed by this Court in Archer v Revenue and Customs Commissioners [2023] EWCA Civ 626, the question is whether — viewed objectively and in light of the particular landlord's experience and circumstances — a reasonable excuse has been made out. That assessment is necessarily fact-specific. The Upper Tribunal's conclusion that it had been satisfied here disclosed no error of law.
The judgement draws a clear distinction between landlords who deliberately evade service and those who have simply not updated their details. The Council had, in any event, located Ms Tabbasam for enforcement purposes, suggesting she was not difficult to find. The Court noted that where a series of communications goes unanswered, some further checking may be warranted.
The decision does not affect the validity of service under s.233, which remains straightforward. What it clarifies is that valid service and absence of reasonable excuse are separate questions, each assessed on its own terms.
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