The flatboy said "a way to avoid the fee, by the way, is to inform the agent that you have taken legal advice, are aware of the position regarding whether or not you have to renew and do not wish to, preferring it to revert to statutory periodic.
obviously there is a risk that the LL may get upset and want to serve notice, but it is probably unlikely in this market. i would stick to your guns and say you want it to revert to statutory periodic."
Not good advice Flatboy. The letting agent will most likely have loss insurance that the tenant will be paying for, so if they serve notice and have an empty property, they don't lose anything. They get the chance to get a new lot of fees from a new tenant. In this market new tenants means more money, and in this market, thats only a good thing for landlords/letting agents
Tenants in this case, have two choices. pay the fees OR don't pay the fees and deal with consequences