Fees for social housing regulation will be introduced from October 2017.

The social housing regulator – which was issued powers to charge fees under the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 – has also published terms of reference for a new Fees and Resources Advisory Panel.

The panel will meet up for the first time in October to enable engagement on fees with a range of stakeholders, as well as providing transparency.

Initial proposals were set out in a discussion paper in 2014 and a statutory consultation was held at the end of 2016, consulting extensively with sector-representative bodies.

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The new fees regime will include:

• a one-off flat-rate registration fee of £2,500 for successful registration with the regulator
• a fixed annual fee of £300 for providers with less than 1,000 social housing units
• an annual per unit fee for large providers with 1,000 or more social housing units, for 2017/18 this will be £4.72

“Following extensive consultation with the social housing sector, we undertook to make some changes to the initial proposals,” said Julian Ashby, chair of the HCA Regulation Committee.

“This included delaying the introduction of fees to October 2017 and setting up a Fees and Resources Advisory Panel.
 
“I hope the guidance we have published today reinforces our aim for the fee-charging scheme to be fair, simple, transparent and practical.”

Due to the decision to start charging fees from 1st October, 50% of the annual amount is payable for 2017/2018.