How to Handle Maintenance Requests Without Creating Legal Exposure
A compliant approach to logging, responding to, and resolving requests.
Insights · Landlord Strategy & Compliance
On this page
- Why maintenance requests are a legal pressure point
- Building a system that logs every request
- How quickly a landlord should respond
- Sorting urgent repairs from routine ones
- Documenting how and when a request was resolved
- Common mistakes that create exposure
- Communicating with tenants along the way
- What happens if a tenant escalates to the LTB
Why maintenance requests are a legal pressure point
Under the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, a landlord has an ongoing duty to maintain a rental unit and the residential complex in a good state of repair, fit for habitation, and compliant with health, safety, housing and maintenance standards. That duty doesn't pause because a landlord is busy, short on cash flow, or waiting on a contractor's schedule. Every maintenance request a tenant submits is, functionally, a small test of whether that duty is being met in real time — and if the relationship ever sours, those requests and how they were handled often become the first thing a tenant's paralegal pulls together for a T6 application alleging a landlord didn't meet their maintenance obligations.
That doesn't mean every request is a legal emergency. Most maintenance issues get resolved quickly and never come up again. But the landlords who run into trouble at the LTB are rarely the ones who responded too slowly to one single request — they're usually the ones with no system at all, so when a dispute does arise, there's no record showing what was asked for, when, and what was done about it. Building a simple, consistent process protects both sides: tenants get repairs handled predictably, and landlords build a paper trail that speaks for itself if a disagreement ever needs to be resolved.
Key point
The goal isn't to respond perfectly to every request. It's to be able to show, months or years later, exactly what was requested, when it was addressed, and what was done — because that record is what actually protects a landlord at a hearing.
Building a system that logs every request
A maintenance log doesn't need to be complicated. A spreadsheet, a shared inbox, or a simple property-management app all work, as long as every request gets a timestamp, a description in the tenant's own words, the unit, and a status. The habit that matters most is capturing requests the moment they arrive, even informal ones. A tenant who mentions a dripping faucet in a hallway conversation or a text message has still made a maintenance request — it just hasn't been written down yet. Encouraging tenants to submit requests in writing (even a simple text or email) and then logging them consistently closes that gap.
It's also worth logging requests that turn out to be outside the landlord's responsibility — for example, a tenant's own appliance, or damage the tenant may have caused. Recording those too, along with the reasoning for how they were handled, avoids the appearance that only "convenient" requests get written down. A log that only contains the requests a landlord responded to quickly looks selective; a log that captures everything, including the slow or complicated ones, looks credible.
How quickly a landlord should respond
The RTA doesn't set out a universal number of days within which every repair must be completed — timelines are generally judged against what's reasonable given the nature of the problem. What matters is that the response is prompt and proportionate. Acknowledging a request within a day or two, even just to confirm it was received and explain next steps, is usually inexpensive to do and goes a long way. Silence, even temporary silence, is often what pushes a tenant toward feeling they have no choice but to file a complaint or an application.
A practical approach is to set internal targets: an immediate acknowledgment for every request, a same-day or next-day response for anything urgent, and a reasonable, communicated timeline for routine repairs that require scheduling a contractor or ordering parts. When a repair genuinely can't be completed quickly, telling the tenant why and giving an updated timeframe is almost always better than letting the request sit silently — adjudicators tend to view communicated delays very differently from unexplained ones.
Sorting urgent repairs from routine ones
Not every request carries the same weight, and treating them all identically can actually create inefficiency and risk. Urgent issues generally involve health, safety, or habitability — no heat in winter, no running water, a security risk like a broken lock or door, electrical hazards, or significant leaks. These warrant same-day attention wherever possible, and in some cases emergency contractor dispatch, because the consequences of delay (and the exposure if a tenant is harmed or displaced) are highest here.
Routine issues — a sticking window, a cosmetic concern, a slow drain — can reasonably be scheduled within a communicated window without causing legal risk, provided the tenant isn't left guessing. The risk isn't in taking time to fix a routine issue; it's in letting a request go unacknowledged long enough that a tenant reasonably concludes nothing is going to happen, or in misclassifying something urgent as routine and leaving a genuine safety issue unresolved.
Documenting how and when a request was resolved
Closing the loop on a maintenance request matters as much as opening it. When a repair is completed, note the date, what was done, who did the work (in-house or a named contractor), and, where practical, a photo of the completed repair. If the tenant confirms the issue is resolved, even a short "thanks, that's fixed" text is worth saving. This isn't about building a defensive paper trail for its own sake — it's about having an accurate, contemporaneous record that reflects what actually happened, which is exactly the kind of evidence an adjudicator finds persuasive because it wasn't created after the fact.
Invoices and receipts from contractors are useful here too, not just for tax purposes but as independent confirmation that work was actually performed on the dates claimed. Landlords who keep this kind of documentation routinely find that disputes resolve faster, because there's rarely room for a serious disagreement about what happened once dated records are on the table.
Common mistakes that create exposure
A few patterns show up repeatedly in disputes that reach the LTB. One is conditioning a repair on something unrelated — for example, telling a tenant a repair will happen once a late rent balance is cleared. Maintenance obligations and rent obligations are separate under the RTA, and tying them together can look, at a hearing, like using repairs as leverage. Another is relying entirely on verbal promises without any written follow-up, which leaves nothing to point to later. A third is letting a string of "we'll get to it" responses accumulate without ever revisiting the list, until a tenant who's been asking for months finally escalates.
A subtler mistake is inconsistency — fixing requests quickly for some tenants and slowly for others without any clear, documented reason tied to the nature of the repair. Even if there's no discriminatory intent, an uneven pattern is hard to explain after the fact and can invite scrutiny that a consistent process would have avoided entirely.
Communicating with tenants along the way
Clear, respectful communication reduces the chance a maintenance issue turns into a dispute in the first place. Telling a tenant what to expect — "a plumber is booked for Thursday," "we're waiting on a part that should arrive next week" — costs little and generally defuses frustration, because most tenants aren't upset that a repair takes time; they're upset that they don't know what's happening. When access to the unit is needed to complete a repair, following the RTA's notice requirements for entry (generally 24 hours' written notice, except in genuine emergencies) keeps the process itself compliant, not just the repair.
What happens if a tenant escalates to the LTB
If a tenant believes maintenance obligations haven't been met, they may file a T6 application asking the LTB to order repairs, a rent abatement, or other remedies. At a hearing, the landlord's maintenance log, communications, invoices, and photos are generally the strongest tools available to show that requests were taken seriously and addressed within a reasonable time — or, where a delay did happen, that it was explained and proportionate to the circumstances. Landlords without that kind of record are left relying on memory, which rarely holds up as well as contemporaneous documentation against a tenant's own notes and photos.
Common misconception
Some landlords assume that because a repair eventually got done, there's nothing to worry about. A T6 can still succeed, and a rent abatement can still be ordered, based on how long a tenant went without a working repair — even if the issue is now fixed. Promptness and documentation, not just eventual completion, are what matter.
This article provides general information about Ontario landlord and tenant law.
It is not legal advice. For advice about a specific situation, consult a licensed
paralegal or lawyer, or contact the Landlord and Tenant Board.
Frequently Asked Questions
There's generally no fixed number of days in the RTA; the standard is reasonableness given the issue. Urgent, health-or-safety issues warrant a much faster response than minor cosmetic ones.
A landlord can encourage written requests, but a verbal request is still a valid request. Many landlords simply log verbal requests themselves at the time they're received to keep the record consistent.
Generally no. Maintenance obligations and rent obligations are treated separately under the RTA, and linking them can create additional legal risk for the landlord.
At minimum: the date received, the unit, a description, the date addressed, what was done, who performed the work, and any related communication or photos.
Generally yes — 24 hours' written notice is required for entry to carry out repairs, except in a genuine emergency where immediate entry may be justified.
A T6 is a tenant application alleging the landlord breached maintenance obligations. The LTB may order repairs, a rent abatement, or other remedies if the application succeeds.
Withholding rent unilaterally generally isn't an approved remedy and can expose the tenant to their own risk. The proper route is usually a T6 application asking the LTB for a remedy such as an abatement.
Generally the tenant, if the appliance belongs to them and isn't part of the rental unit as provided by the landlord. It's still worth logging the request and the reasoning for how it was handled.
Not necessarily. A tenant may still seek an abatement for the period before the repair was completed, so how long the issue went unresolved can still matter.
A consistent, dated maintenance log, written communications with the tenant, contractor invoices, and photos of completed repairs are generally the most persuasive evidence.
Related reading
Reviewed by Ryan J. Manilla, BA, JD
Legal Reviewer · Landlord Tenant Ontario