TPO extends its ruling against Lettings Solutions Ltd

Published on Friday, 25 August 2017.

Further to the press release in May 2017 announcing that The Property Ombudsman (TPO) scheme had expelled Essex based letting agent, Lettings Solutions Ltd, and imposed a two year exclusion, TPO’s independent Disciplinary and Standards Committee has now ruled that the agent should be excluded from membership of TPO and from registration for redress for a further year.

The agent was initially expelled in April 2017 after failing to pay an award of £1,423.74 following a review of a highly complex landlord complaint concerning three rental properties in Essex. Now Lettings Solutions Ltd has also failed to pay an award of £900, as directed by the Ombudsman after her investigation of another complaint.  This was to reimburse prospective tenants for a tenancy deposit of £750, who had to withdraw when there was unreasonable delay in the tenancy starting.  The Ombudsman also awarded £150 for the inconvenience caused.

This means that Lettings Solutions Ltd will, for an additional period, no longer be able to register with TPO for lettings redress as required by the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 and could not operate as a sales agent because redress registration is also required by Section 23A of the Estate Agents Act 1979.