Main tenant cheats on Rental Relief

[jessie1314]

I'm a Singapore PR. I'm sub-renting a HDB owned shop from a main tenant. All was good for the first year and when we renewed for second year, we didn't think much about the tenancy agreement as we thought we could based on trust.

Not long after that, the government announced rental relief for April to July for commercial properties due to Covid. The main tenant received all the rental relief but kept it silent. Only during August when government requested main tenant to pass down rental waivers to subtenant then she told us about the rental relief. Main thing is she told us we were entitled for 80%. After that, we found out it is 100% so we went to confront her. She changed her "testimony" and told us oh it is 100% and she will pass it down to us between Sep to Dec 2020.

Things didn't end there. Her attitude changed tremendously and she started to hurl false accusations towards us on tiny little things verbally and in text message. All these are affecting us running our business peacefully. That was when we decided to move out. However, our tenancy only expires next year in March. We requested for the refund of the rental relief for Nov-Dec if we were to give 2 months notice or 3 months of rental relief if 1 month notice.

According to the contract, we need to serve 2 months notice when we are not intending to renew after lease expires. In this case, is it possible to fight for our rental deposit?

[tt1973]

If you are not renewing in March 2021, formal notice should be served in Jan 2021.

If you prematurely terminate your tenancy, by right you are liable to pay till end of the lease. Therefore, I doubt you can fight for the rental deposit if you end your lease earlier.

If this is a retail shop, the rental relief may even be 4 months. Why not meantime write to IRAS to fight for your 2 months rental relief?