Letting agent software for Scotland
Scotland has its own tenancy law, its own deposit rules, its own working days and its own regulator. Saltire Systems is built for all of it natively, not adapted from an English product with a Scottish tick-box bolted on.
Scotland is not England with different postcodes
Most UK lettings software is written for the English market and treats Scotland as a configuration option. That is where the expensive mistakes come from. Here are four differences Saltire handles by default.
Working days are Scottish working days
A deposit must be protected within 30 working days. Scotland's bank holidays are not England's: 2 January is a holiday, Easter Monday is not, the summer holiday is the first Monday in August, and St Andrew's Day counts. Saltire computes the real date. A tenancy starting 1 December 2026 must be protected by 18 January 2027, which is 48 calendar days, not the 42 a "six weeks" rule of thumb would give you.
One council notification, not two
Water and waste water are billed together with Council Tax by the council on Scottish Water's behalf. So a change of occupancy needs one council notification, not the two an English workflow expects. Saltire assembles the details, tracks completion, and sends the separate energy supplier notice for you.
Right to Rent does not apply
Right to Rent immigration checks are England-only. Saltire deliberately does not ask your team to run them, and does not clutter your referencing workflow with a check that has no legal basis here.
The PRT has no end date
Private Residential Tenancies are open-ended. There is no "expiry", eviction runs on statutory grounds, and rent can only rise once every 12 months with three clear months' notice. Saltire enforces those rules rather than trusting anyone to remember them.
Every statutory clock in one place
The compliance cockpit is a portfolio-wide view of every Scottish lettings duty, risk-sorted so the criminal-offence items lead. A health score shows how much of your portfolio is in order. Update a date inline to clear a clock, and export the lot as CSV for an audit trail.
| Duty | Frequency | What happens if you miss it |
|---|---|---|
| Gas safety record (CP12) | Annual | Criminal offence |
| Tenancy deposit protection | 30 working days from tenancy start | Up to 3× the deposit at the First-tier Tribunal |
| Landlord registration | Every 3 years | Criminal offence, and the property cannot be let |
| HMO licence, where applicable | Per licence term | Criminal offence |
| EICR, electrical safety | Every 5 years | Enforcement action, invalid insurance |
| Legionella risk assessment | Roughly 2 yearly | Health and safety liability |
| PAT testing, furnished lets | Annual | Health and safety liability |
| EPC | Every 10 years | Cannot market the property |
| Rent review | Once per 12 months | An invalid increase, which the tenant can ignore |
Tenant pet requests and their response deadline, and Awaab's Law damp and mould timescales detected from maintenance reports, are tracked automatically alongside them. Ask Munro "any compliance overdue?" and you get the answer in a sentence.
Everything a Scottish letting agent actually does
Not a lettings tab bolted onto a sales CRM. Every stage of a tenancy, from the first application to the final deposit return, built in and joined up.
Tenant referencing
Affordability, guarantor position, credit outcome and the references themselves in one file per applicant per property. Employers and previous landlords answer on their own secure link with no login, and the previous-landlord questions are the ones that matter: was rent paid on time, what condition was the property left in, would you rent to them again. The recommendation is exactly that, a recommendation. Nothing is auto-rejected, and you can always override with a note, because there are good reasons to accept someone who fails a multiple.
Applications reviewed by the landlord
Record a prospective tenant's application against the listing, then send it to the landlord. They review it in their own portal: the proposed rent against the asking rent, the applicant's position, your notes. They accept with a note or decline with a reason, and you keep control of what happens next.
Inventories and inspections
The inventory is the evidence every deposit deduction stands on, and in Scotland the burden of proof sits with the agent. Check-in, mid-term and check-out reports, room by room, with condition, cleanliness and dated photos taken straight from your phone. One click clones the check-out from the check-in with the original condition and photos as the baseline. Fair wear and tear is excluded from the deduction total automatically, which is precisely what makes the rest of the claim defensible. The tenant signs on their own link, and every report renders as a branded PDF.
Deposits, counted properly
A live countdown in real Scottish working days, amber as it closes and red once it has passed. Record the scheme and its reference to protect the deposit, then serve the prescribed information, both tracked separately because doing one without the other still breaches the regulations. SafeDeposits Scotland, Letting Protection Service Scotland and mydeposits Scotland are all supported, with a bulk CSV if you are lodging several at once. At the end of the tenancy the deposit return seeds itself from the check-out report and works out the tenant and landlord split.
Rent collection by Direct Debit
Email the tenant a link, they complete the Direct Debit instruction on a compliant hosted form, and the mandate is live. Collections run against your own connected payment account, never through ours, because rent is client money and belongs to the landlord. Saltire schedules around the real Bacs timings so money lands on the due date, and rent is only posted to the ledger when the bank confirms it, never optimistically. No tenant is ever chased for a payment that is merely in flight.
Client money accounting and CMP
A registered Scottish letting agent must hold client money separately, be covered by a Client Money Protection scheme, and carry Professional Indemnity Insurance. Saltire tracks all three, and runs the three-way reconciliation the Letting Agent Code of Practice actually asks for: bank balance against client ledger against the sum of individual landlord balances. If the bank holds less than you owe, that is a client money shortfall and it is flagged in red. Landlord statements generate themselves as branded PDFs when a payment run is marked paid.
Rent reviews and increase notices
Three clear calendar months' notice, once every 12 months, one open review at a time, all enforced when you create the review and again when you serve it. Serving is a single compliant step: Saltire generates the Rent Increase Notice with the tenant's 21-day right to refer the increase to Rent Service Scotland, records your signature and emails it. You also get an advisory check against the Housing (Scotland) Act 2024 formula, ready for the day Rent Control Areas are designated.
Maintenance, triaged by AI
Tenants report issues with photos from the tenant portal. Munro reads the description and looks at the photos to work out urgency, likely cause and the right trade, suggests self-help where it genuinely applies, and raises the works order. The landlord approves from their portal, the contractor is dispatched, and the invoice is drafted on completion.
Landlord tax records, ready for Making Tax Digital
Rental income and costs categorised the way HMRC categorises them, so nothing has to be re-keyed from a PDF statement into your landlord's tax software. Saltire always records gross rent as income with your fee as a separate allowable expense, which is the single most common self-assessment error for agent-managed property. Residential mortgage interest is kept out of the expense total, because it is a 20% tax reduction rather than a deduction. Quarterly updates are cumulative, so that is the figure shown. Your landlord sees their year to date in their own portal, and exports a CSV for their accountant.
Utilities and change of occupancy
Meter readings, MPAN and MPRN, the council notification that covers Council Tax and water together, and the energy supplier notice, which Saltire sends. On a move-out it states plainly that the landlord is liable for Council Tax from day one of the void, because there is no grace period in Scotland and a long void can attract an empty-property premium. Readings are stored exactly as typed, so leading zeros and decimals survive a supplier dispute.
Scottish lettings portals, not just the big three
Rightmove, Zoopla and OnTheMarket are covered. So are the portals Scottish lettings agents actually rely on, which most UK software ignores.
Citylets
Scotland's lettings portal. Feed and lead-back both supported.
Lettingweb
Lettings only, strong across the central belt.
s1homes
Scotland-wide, sales and lettings.
Each feed only carries the listing types that portal handles, so a sale listing can never leak into a lettings-only feed. Enquiries come back automatically and land in your pipeline as buyers or vendor leads, matched to the right property. ESPC, GSPC and TSPC feeds are supported for sales.
Tenants and landlords serve themselves
Tenant portal
Tenancy details and documents, rent status, maintenance reported with photos and triaged by AI in seconds, pet requests with the statutory response clock running, and inventories signed without a login.
Landlord portal
Portfolio overview, maintenance approved or declined, statements and compliance certificates, tenant applications reviewed and decided, and their own Making Tax Digital position for the year.
Everything submitted through a portal flows straight into your maintenance, finance and compliance workflows. Nothing needs re-typing, and nothing sits in an inbox waiting for someone to notice it.
Scottish lettings questions
Is Saltire Systems suitable for a lettings-only agency?
Yes. Sales can be switched off per office, and the lettings module runs on its own. Everything described on this page is included on every plan, from £99 a month.
How long do I have to protect a tenancy deposit in Scotland?
30 working days from the start of the tenancy, and the prescribed information must be served on the tenant in the same window. Working days means Scottish working days, which are not the same as England's. Saltire computes the real deadline for you and counts down to it, because getting it wrong exposes the landlord to an award of up to three times the deposit at the First-tier Tribunal.
Does Saltire handle client money accounting?
Yes, including the three-way reconciliation the Letting Agent Code of Practice requires: bank balance against the client ledger against the sum of individual landlord balances. Shortfalls are flagged in red, your CMP scheme and PII policy details are recorded, and Munro nudges you if an account has not been reconciled in 30 days.
Can I collect rent through Saltire?
Yes, by Bacs Direct Debit. Collections run against your own connected payment account rather than ours, because rent is client money. Saltire schedules around real Bacs timings so money lands on the due date, and only posts rent to the ledger once the bank confirms it.
Do I need separate inventory software?
No. Inventories are native: check-in, mid-term and check-out, room by room, with photos from your phone, tenant e-signature, branded PDFs, and a check-out that clones the check-in as its baseline. Fair wear and tear is excluded from deductions automatically.
Does Saltire help with Making Tax Digital for my landlords?
It keeps the digital records, categorised to HMRC's own categories, with the quarterly cumulative position and a CSV export. Your landlord or their accountant files the return. Saltire is not currently HMRC-recognised MTD filing software, and we would rather say so than imply otherwise.
Do I need to run Right to Rent checks in Scotland?
No. Right to Rent is an England-only scheme. Saltire deliberately leaves it out of the Scottish referencing workflow rather than asking your team to do work with no legal basis here.
Can I increase the rent on a PRT?
Once every 12 months, with at least three clear calendar months' notice, using the statutory notice. Saltire checks both rules when you create the review and again when you serve it, generates the notice including the tenant's 21-day right to refer the increase to Rent Service Scotland, and applies the new rent automatically on the effective date.
Scottish lettings, done properly.
From £99 a month.
Every feature on this page is included on every plan. No lettings add-on, no per-tenancy fee.
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