The Analysis News & Opinions


Call for action on leasehold administrators


A major trade body for the conveyancing industry has issued its response to the Department for Communities and Local Government’s call for evidence on whether a new regulatory model is needed for agents in the leasehold sector. The call for evidence has sought views on


the regulation of letting and managing agents, and the approaches the government could take to implement any such regulation in order to “best protect and empower” tenants and leaseholders. In its response,


the Conveyancing


Association highlighted a number of current issues within the leasehold market that needed to be addressed, including: l The unreasonable fees charged by lease administrators. l Duplication of charging. l The ‘invention’ of additional services just to generate extra revenue. l Significant delays in provision of services by the lease administrator. It suggested a range of remedies, including:


l Legislation should be created requiring that reasonable fees are charged with a limit on the services so that new ones are not simply invented, as is currently the case.


A menu of charges should be set by the secretary of state and reviewed biennially in line with the RPI. l Administrative services to be delivered within five working days of receipt of payment, or the fee should be refunded. l Any lease administrator charging another party to provide services should be required to be registered with a fit-for-purpose redress scheme; the schemes should include the provision of services in both letting and property management, and should be funded by a per-complaint payment – whether or not the complaint is upheld. As part of its response the association also


called for more resources for trading standards offices in order to enforce current regulation effectively and to take action against rogue landlords and agents. It wants to see a licensing scheme for all managing agents put into place to ensure they act professionally and efficiently. It believes any lease administrator that is


undertaking charged-for services, or has access to client money or property, should be regulated. This should include management companies as well as property managers, landlords, freeholders, estate rent charge


‘Data supervision is still appropriate’


The data-protection regulator has insisted that existing forms of supervision can still succeed in the world of big data, and after the introduction of GDPR. Speaking at the TechUK Data Ethics


Summit, the information commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, said: “There is a new law in town. The General Data Protection Regulation. And this is a significant step up in the law. It was drafted by legislators here in the UK, and throughout Europe, for the very purpose of trying to tackle opaque decision-making by machines.


January 2018 “The GDPR significantly enhances


people’s ability to challenge decisions made by machines. It provides for a measure of algorithmic transparency. “It provides for human intervention in


decisions that have legal or similar effects. “This is not a new game played by different


rules. The rules remain the same – fairness, transparency, accountability – and my office is well placed to regulate them. “The idea that data protection, embodied


in legislation, does not work in a big-data context is wrong.”


www.CCRMagazine.co.uk owners, companies,


right-to-manage management tenant associations, and


commonhold associations. Beth Rudolf, director of delivery at the


Conveyancing Association, said: “This area has been a major concern for some time and our response seeks to ensure that the growing costs and delays, that are a seemingly ‘natural’ part of dealing with certain lease administrators, are no longer deemed acceptable. We have always encouraged our members to educate lease administrators using template letters explaining the legal obligations and case law around unreasonable fees, but our data shows that the situation has, in fact, got worse. “Regulation seems to be the only way of


achieving solid consumer protection in a scenario where the payer of the service is not the contracting party for the service. The fact that the industry, including managing agents, have been calling for regulation is compelling and, we believe, now is certainly the time for action to be taken.”


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