Effective enforcement is crucial to stamp out rogue lettings agents and protect consumers says safeagent.
In the latest edition of its Effective Enforcement Toolkit, .it claims to give councils tools to enforce legislation, providing Trading Standards teams with a guide to regulating agents, in a step-by-step format.
First published in 2016, safeagent created the kit as a resource to support local authorities in protecting tenants and landlords, creating consistency in enforcement, and raising standards and professionalism in the industry.
The third edition released this week reflects the legal requirement for lettings and management agents to belong to a client money protection scheme and over 100 Tribunal decisions from across England.
It also includes template warning letters to agents failing to comply with legal duties, advice on serving civil penalties and even examples on how to highlight enforcement action to the local media.
Isobel Thomson, chief executive of safeagent, says: “We’re all too aware of the challenges Local Authorities face in carrying out their work in the PRS. That’s why we created the Effective Enforcement Toolkit in the first place to support their work in ensuring that all agents comply with the legislation.
“We would like to thank those Trading Standards officers from across the country who gave their time and expertise in developing this latest version to ensure their colleagues across England are fully equipped to enforce the important legislation that protects landlords and tenants."
Sean Hooker, Head of Redress at the Property Redress Scheme, adds: “The Toolkit is a superb resource for Trading Standards teams, helping to protect renters and landlords, while also driving up professionalism and compliance within the lettings industry. It is an example of collaborative working that can only be to the benefit of all in the sector.”
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This can only be seen as a good thing, so long as the local authority has the man power to do the job.
This is a sales pitch for a product you idiot.
As far as having the manpower to do 'the job', councils get to keep the fines that they impose on landlords, so if you think they don't have the man power, you're deluded. The man power pays for itself. And before you start down the 'if they don't break the law they have nothing to worry about' line... councils send out undertrained and ill informed 'housing officers' to target landlords and FIND non compliances. Not react to non compliances, FIND them.
How would you like a barely trained copper following you about who only got paid if they caught you commiting a crime? Don't you think that sooner or later they would 'find' a crime to arrest you on?
Fines of tens of thousands are routinely issued with landlords guilty until proven innocent, who then have to defend themselves at their own, unrecoverable, cost, many of whom haven't done the slightest thing wrong.
So no. It can't only be seen as a good thing.
Sales Pitch. Dont the councils know the law, landlords have been around for thousands of years.
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