A legal hold keeps the records behind a dispute exactly as they were. It overrides everything else, including the plan you are on.
Who this is for: letting agencies and landlords.
Legal hold: subject, property, reason and when it was opened.
What you are deciding
Whether a record needs a hold, and what you can still do with it once it has one.
Your options
- A notice is served, referred or relied on in a claim. The notice, its certificate of service and what is attached to them are held. You do not need to do anything.
- Your plan changes. Held records stay readable and downloadable on Solo, after a failed payment and after a subscription ends.
- You want to delete something held. It cannot be deleted while the hold is in place.
A worked example
A Form 4A served on Wednesday 4 November 2026 is referred to the tribunal on Thursday 19 November 2026. The notice, the certificate of service, the rent review and the gas safety record attached to the evidence pack are placed under hold. In January the agency's subscription lapses and the account moves to Solo. Every held document can still be opened and downloaded, and the evidence pack is still available on the notice's page.
What Abide.Rent does for you
- Lists every record under hold on the Legal hold page.
- Keeps a write-once copy of each held document.
- Keeps held records open on any plan.
If something goes wrong
- “A legal hold prevents delete”
What to do: Records on hold cannot be deleted while the notice, referral or claim is live. - You want to release a hold
What to do: Use Close where it is offered. Holds tied to a live notice stay until it ends.
Common mistakes
- Exporting everything in a hurry because a subscription is ending. Held records stay open.
- Trying to replace a held certificate. Add the newer one; the held one is kept beside it.
What to do next
More in Notices
The evidence packAssemble the evidence for a referred rent increase in one PDF: the notice, proof of service, the rent range and the decisions you rely on.
Bring past notices and dates onto the recordRecord a notice you served before you used Abide.Rent, a safety record you gave the tenant on paper, or a request received long ago, each with the day it really happened.
Following a tribunal referralFrom the tenant's application to the decision: record the directions, prepare and send your statement, and keep track of an inspection or hearing.