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<p>The Government is committed to promoting fairness and transparency for leaseholders
and freeholders and ensuring that consumers are protected from abuse and poor service.</p><p><br>There
are a number of ways to take action against a poor managing agent. Freeholders can
make a formal complaint through their managing agent’s own complaints procedure. A
complaint can also be made to one of the Government-recognised redress scheme. By
law all property agents are required to belong to one of the following three redress
schemes: Ombudsman Services Property, Property Redress Scheme and The Property Ombudsman.</p><p><br>To
provide additional protections, on 21 December 2017, we set out a package of measures
to tackle abuses and unfair practices in the leasehold market. This includes legislation
to ensure that freeholders who pay charges for the maintenance of communal areas and
facilities on a private or mixed use estate, can access equivalent rights as leaseholders
to challenge the reasonableness of service charges.</p><p><br>On 1 April, we published
the response to our recent call for evidence on <em>protecting consumers in the letting
and managing agent market</em>. Proposals include establishing a working group to
consider how fees such as service charges should be presented to consumers and to
explore the best means to challenge fees which are unjustified.</p>
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