How am I protected by the Building Safety Act?

As a qualifying leaseholder, you are protected by the Building Safety Act 2022 from the cost of replacing your building’s unsafe cladding or other historical safety defects. They came into force on 28 June 2022 for relevant buildings with relevant historical safety defects. 

The Act ensures that: 

• developers pay to fix buildings they developed or refurbished even if they no longer own them 
• companies and building owners associated with those developers must pay for fixing historical safety defects – preventing the use of complex corporate structures to avoid liability 
• where developers cannot be identified funding for remediating unsafe cladding is available 
• leaseholders are protected from crippling bills for historical safety defects 

You can check if you qualify for protections here. 

Your protections 

Qualifying leaseholders are protected from all cladding system remediation costs. You are also exempt from all historical remediation costs if on 14 February 2022:  

• the value of your lease was less than £325,000 in Greater London or £175,000 elsewhere in England  
• your landlord has a group net worth of more than £2 million per relevant building 

The Act ensures that any contribution required from qualifying leaseholders for non-cladding defects and interim measures (including waking watch costs) is firmly capped and spread over 10 years, with costs already paid out since 28 June 2017 counting towards the cap. If remediation costs exceed the cap, building owners must make up the difference.