UK Landlord Forum / Life

I used a nation-wide agent to manage my property when I let my house for the first time last year, and when the tenants moved out this Sept I took the opportunity to go with a local independant agent. The reason for my disatisfaction with the original agent was because they used seemingly dishonest and inept contractors, I was quoted over 1200 pounds for work (some of which turned out to be unnecessary) which I eventually got done by a professional contractor who I found myself, for the sum of 250 GBP.

The old agents had a gas safety inspection carried out in August, when they still managed my property. When the new agent took over in early September, they failed to forward this certificate (and other documents) so the inspection was carried out again by the new agent. The old agent has now sent me their final statement and I see that they have deducted 90 GBP for the certificate (the new agent had the inspection carried out for 68 GBP).

I suspect I won't be able to claw back the 90 pounds, and it isn't a huge amount but I resent the way that the old agents have behaved in an unprofessinal manner and have been deliberately obstructive. I'm really posting this to see if anyone else has had problems when moving from one agent to another.  Any thoughts and advice on what I can do, if anything, would be much appreciated.

Hello Janet,

Sorry to hear of your problems.  Why not name the agent.  Some agents do make things difficult.

I will never let an agent handle one jot of maintenance work.  The unscrupulous agent will fleece you.  And as you don't know the builder, how can you guarantee you're getting a good job done?

Seeing how they've cost you dearly, I would dig my heels in over the £90.

They charged you for something which is time-critical.  An in-force gas certificate is a legal requirement for every day a tenant is in occupation.  So a cert which is late is valueless.  They know full well a late cert means you'll have had to do another with the new agent.

So refuse to pay.  It's not the fact it's been done whihc allows them to charge, it's the fact it's been done on time.  They have failed to live up to their contractual commitment to you, so they can't charge you for a job not properly done.

If they are a national firm they should be in the Property Ombusdman scheme.  Start there.

Let us know how you get on.

Thanks for your reply, Jeremy, and I would prefer to manage the maintenance side (I pretty much did, thanks to mybuilder.com) but it's difficult as I currently live in the US. The agent (Haart, and their property management side of things - Spicer Haart) didn't want to deal with contractors that I appointed so it was all a bit of an ordeal.

Regarding the gas safety certificate, Haart did the right thing in that they had my property inspected in August, while they still managed things and their tenant was still in residence. Where it all went wrong was when I forgot that the inspection was due (my mistake) and when Haart failed to forward the certificate and all other documents pertaining to my house to the new agent. I did ask them to give all paperwork to the new agent at the changeover date but all they handed over were the keys. My new agent found a tenant and didn't realise that the safety inspection had recently been carried out under Haart's instruction, and I didn't pick it up until Haart sent me a final statement this week, detailing charges they'd deducted from the last rental payment to me.

The new agent has told me that Haart is a complete nightmare to deal with, and he has taken over another property that was formerly managed by Haart so I'm not the only one in the area to be disatisfied.

The entire year with them has been so unpleasant and even after cutting my ties with them they're still being a pain. I'm afraid of seeming petty when it's just a small sum, but add it to all the other things that have happened then I guess this is the proverbial straw. They also need to know why I left them and where their customer service could be improved so I have now made a formal complaint to their customer services dept, and backed up the facts with copies of e-mail exchanges.

If I don't get any joy with the in-house complaints dept then I'll certainly go to the Property Ombudsman, thank you for pointing me in that direction.