You should have now received a letter from us explains your new rent and service charges from April 2025.
Your letter outlines how your new rent has been calculated. If you pay service charges, the letter also details the day to day costs of maintaining your building and estate.
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Here's what you need to know about the changes happening from April, and how to contact us if you have any questions or need support.
Your new rent and service charges changes will apply from:
1 April 2025 – if you pay monthly
7 April 2025 – if you pay weekly
We follow government guidance to calculate and set your rent each year. Social housing landlords, like us, must set their rents in line with the Regulator of Social Housing’s Rent Standard. This is the standard method used by all housing associations.
We use the government’s guidelines for setting your rent based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI). Consumer Price Index or CPI measures the change in prices of everyday goods and services typically bought by UK households.
We work out your rent by taking the previous September’s CPI rate, which was 1.7% in 2024, and adding 1% to it. Your rent will increase by 2.7% from April 2025. Your letter will confirm the exact amount you need to pay.
Your rent is set based on an inflation measure called the Retail Price Index (RPI). The formula we use varies, according to the terms of your lease. It’s always linked to the RPI plus the percentage set out in your lease. Your letter will confirm the exact amount you need to pay.
There may be an increase in the amount you pay for your service charges from April 2025. This is because of the rising costs we’re paying for these services to your building or estate. We don’t make a profit from these charges and work hard to ensure that all customers are charged fairly for the services they receive. Your letter includes your service charges for the year ahead with a detailed breakdown of the charges for each service we provide.
Please note: If you’re a variable service charge customer, you’ll usually receive a year end statement from us every September. This shows the difference between the charges we estimated in February and the actual cost of providing the service. We’re only able to provide these actual costs once we have checked and reconciled the accounts. We’re aware some customers are still awaiting their year-end statements for previous years. We are working hard to complete these and apologise for the delay in getting these out to you.
Find out more about service charges and how we calculate them.
We’re a not-for-profit organisation, and we use income from rents to provide services, invest in existing homes and develop new affordable homes. The costs we pay for services at Moat have increased and we are seeing higher demand for the services we provide. We need to make sure we have enough money to invest in existing homes, and to plan for the future.
You can learn more about how your money was spent during 2023/24 in our Customer Annual Report.
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Update your payments
If you pay your rent and service charges by Direct Debit, you don’t need to do anything. Your payments will automatically be adjusted, and you’ll receive confirmation of this from a payment system called AllPay Limited, in March 2025.
If you manage your payments online, please adjust your payments to the new amount from the day of your increase.
Check your Housing Benefit and Universal Credit payments
The Government has confirmed that benefits will increase in line with inflation. If you use Housing Benefit, Universal Credit, or another form of benefits to pay your rent, you'll see these payments rise from April onwards.
We’ll let your local Housing Benefit office know of any changes to your rent and service charge and will work with them to help keep your records up to date. However, it is your responsibility to check that they have received and acted upon this information.
The date that your Housing Benefit is paid into your account may not match the dates of the period it covers – sometimes it is paid in advance, but more often it is paid in arrears.
If your housing costs are paid for by Universal Credit:
You must only use the 'Confirm your housing costs' to-do to report these changes. Do not contact Universal Credit to report them any other way.
Please note: Personal costs such as heating and water supplies to your property are not covered by Housing Benefit or Universal Credit.
We understand that times are tough for many people. If you think your rent increase will be a struggle, please talk to us. Our dedicated Income and Advice team are here to listen and offer you advice on benefits, budgeting and payment plans to assist you with managing rent. Please call us on 0300 323 0011 or email [email protected]
We will do all we can to help and support you.
As well as the support of our Income and Advice Services team, there are lots of different rebates, one-off payments, discounts and grants available. Visit our Cost of living page to find out more.
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