Award Winning
commercial property solutions
Though there is currently no explicit legal obligation on commercial landlords to provide extra cleaning services to prevent coronavirus COVID-19 spreading in their premises, many are taking pragmatic steps says commercial property management specialist Prop-Manage.
Some commercial landlords responsible for common parts are providing more frequent and thorough cleansing of those common parts, particularly frequently touched surfaces such as door handles, elevator buttons and toilets.
David Robbins, Head of Property Management at Prop-Manage, said: “Supplying these extra cleaning services will of course have cost implications and commercial landlords should check the service-charge provisions in their leases to ensure such charges are recoverable.”
Most service-charge provisions contain a sweep-up provision allowing the landlord to recover reasonable costs incurred in line with the principles of good estate management. Some service charge provisions will also allow costs incurred as a result of complying with ‘applicable laws’ to be recovered – although whether a landlord can rely on this type of provision will depend on whether the Government imposes prescriptive measures. In each case, the recoverability of a landlord's costs for such enhanced cleaning measures would be subject to any tenant negotiated service charge cap or specific exclusions in the list of services contained in the lease.
Arguments may arise as to whether the landlord is required to provide certain services - whether by contract or by law - and, where the landlord has discretion to carry out services, whether that discretion is exercised in accordance with the contractual provisions.
Further arguments could arise on the interpretation of what constitute reasonable costs. For example, if Covid-19 becomes more widespread, would providing a hand sanitiser to every occupier that comes onto the premises be a cost that is recoverable as service charge or otherwise?
Further information and advice can be obtained from Prop-Manage - the management arm of the award winning commercial property agency Prop-Search - www.prop-search.com