How to vet a damp-and-mould vendor.
19 questions to ask any damp-and-mould vendor before you sign, grouped under legal accuracy, product capability, evidence, resident experience, operations, workforce, and commercial terms.
Check the numbers on their website first.
Awaab's Law is not a long document. Its timeframes are four numbers: 24 hours, 10 working days, 3 working days, 5 working days.
Some damp-and-mould vendors still quote the wrong numbers on their websites, usually the consultation figures from before the Regulations were final (14 days, 7 days, 7 days). If a vendor's legal content is wrong, their product almost certainly models the wrong windows too. You can check this before the first meeting.
This checklist is designed to be a one-meeting screening tool. If a vendor can't answer these in a first conversation, pass.
The easiest red flag to spot. A vendor that gets Awaab's Law wrong on their website will get it wrong in your implementation.
- Q1.1
Do their published timeframes match the 2025 Regulations exactly?
What to listen for: You're looking for 24 hours emergency, 10 working days significant hazard investigation, 3 working days written summary, 5 working days safety work. Some vendors still quote the pre-final consultation numbers (14 days, 7 days, 7 days). Those are wrong. Treat as a red flag.
- Q1.2
Is the law sourced to legislation.gov.uk and gov.uk guidance, or a blog post?
What to listen for: A serious vendor cites primary sources. Section 42 of the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023 and The Hazards in Social Housing (Prescribed Requirements) (England) Regulations 2025 are the two that matter. If the only citations are press articles, that's a signal.
- Q1.3
Do they distinguish Phase 1 (damp/mould, from 27 Oct 2025) from Phase 2 (2026) and Phase 3 (2027)?
What to listen for: Awaab's Law is phased, and a vendor that treats it as a single deadline hasn't planned for what's coming. Phase 2 (2026) adds excess cold and heat, falls, structural collapse, fire, electrical hazards and explosions, and hygiene hazards; Phase 3 (2027) covers all remaining HHSRS hazards except overcrowding.
Does the product catch problems early, or does it just tidy up after the resident complains?
- Q2.1
Does the system flag risk before visible mould, or after a resident reports it?
What to listen for: Ask for a worked example of a case that was caught before the resident reported anything, and how much warning it gave.
- Q2.2
Is the risk model auditable - can you see why a case fired?
What to listen for: Black-box risk scores are a liability in an Ombudsman case. You want to be able to say, plain-English, what the system saw and when it saw it. 'Relative humidity above threshold for N hours, temperature below M, during a weather window of X' - that level.
- Q2.3
Is coverage per-home at room level, or one sensor per property?
What to listen for: Bathrooms, kitchens, and the main occupied space behave differently. A single sensor per home undercounts risk in the rooms that actually produce moisture. Ask how the vendor scopes coverage per property type.
When the Ombudsman asks for your evidence on a case, you want a vendor that can produce it in minutes.
- Q3.1
Can you export an evidence pack for a single property in under five minutes?
What to listen for: Shareable, timestamped, structured to a format the Ombudsman can read. PDF is acceptable. CSV or JSON is better. "Our team can assemble one in a week" is not.
- Q3.2
Does the property record persist year-over-year?
What to listen for: Damp-and-mould risk is multi-year. A vendor that wipes history at contract renewal, or silos each contract period, leaves you unable to show the regulator a consistent story.
- Q3.3
Is the audit trail append-only, or editable after the fact?
What to listen for: Editable logs are worthless under disrepair claim pressure. You want append-only. Amendments tracked. Original data preserved. Ask to see what happens when someone tries to 'clean up' a timeline.
The way you write to residents is part of the record, so the product's letters need to get the tone right.
- Q4.1
Does the system ship with no-blame communication templates?
What to listen for: The Housing Ombudsman called out "lifestyle" and "behaviours" language in 2021. A vendor whose template letters still let that language through is putting your relationship with residents at risk.
- Q4.2
Is there a vulnerability flag, and does it surface in triage?
What to listen for: MHCLG guidance says vulnerability is taken at face value. The product should let your team record it in a single click and use it in queue ordering. Ask what the triage promotion rules are.
- Q4.3
Can the resident see the case status, or is it landlord-only?
What to listen for: Resident visibility reduces complaints. Any serious damp-and-mould product should offer at least a basic status view that the resident can read without needing to call.
Detection is the easy part. What happens after an alert fires is where vendors diverge.
- Q5.1
Who gets notified when a statutory deadline is approaching, and how?
What to listen for: Approaching-deadline logic should be built into the case queue. The team lead should get the nudge before a deadline lapses, not after.
- Q5.2
Is a remediation network attached, or is dispatch back on you?
What to listen for: If the vendor supplies sensors and software only, your own contractors do the visits and the work, so check you have the capacity. If they offer a full service, ask for their field coverage map and how many UK regions they can reach inside the 5-working-day window.
- Q5.3
Does the system verify a fix worked, or does it close on sign-off?
What to listen for: Post-fix sensor data shows whether a remediation held. A vendor that closes cases on a signed-off job ticket leaves you with no evidence that the problem ended.
Ask who will use the product day to day and who will fix the homes, and what the vendor does to support both.
- Q6.1
Is there a training and accreditation path for your in-house damp-and-mould team?
What to listen for: A vendor that can train and accredit your own staff leaves the skills in your organisation when the contract ends. Ask who delivers the training and who accredits it.
- Q6.2
Who is accountable if a supplier in the chain underperforms?
What to listen for: Ask the vendor to name who is accountable for each link in the chain: detection, investigation, remediation, and verification. Every hand-off between suppliers is a place a case can stall.
How you buy this matters as much as what you buy.
- Q7.1
Is this procurable as a single contract, or do you assemble four suppliers?
What to listen for: A single contract reduces procurement overhead, aligns SLAs, and simplifies accountability when something goes wrong. If a vendor expects you to contract a ventilation installer separately, find that out before you sign.
- Q7.2
Can you start with a pilot before committing to a portfolio rollout?
What to listen for: Ask for a pilot on a few blocks, for a set period, with an outcome you agree and can measure. A vendor who will only sell a whole-portfolio contract is asking you to carry the risk.
Run the checklist on us first.
Book a 30-minute call. We'll walk through every question on this page, show you our answers live, and tell you where we are weaker than a competitor.