Estate Agent - poor service

dwill1503

We are using Haart to sell our house and will complete the sale this week.

We have had nothing but bad service right from the beginning - delayed communication, poor emails (not making sense), one agent broke an item in the house during a viewing, phone calls asking for things they have had already etc. We had also requested a completion date all along of the 5th which they said would be fine with the buyer we accepted. We then met the buyer last week and she said that she had said all along she could complete until the 10th. The EA had never told us this. The EA has also been rather negative on occasion about the buyer and the questions she has asked and just generally very unprofessional.

I just want to know if there is any point in raising an official complaint? I sent a strong email last week outlining our concerns and they said they would review and come back. They haven't. I know that once we've done & paid we have no more to do with them but it is frustrating knowing we are paying them thousands of pounds & we don't get top service.

Their whole ethos seems to be "just get them signed up & tell them anything" and then its downhill from there!!

kellaree

I would wait until the sale is done and dusted to complain myself. Just in case they choose to make the situation worse for you.

Do you think the whole company has given poor service or just an individual? Can you get a hold of the head office? What are you hoping to achieve by filing a complaint?

I feel your pain regarding EA's, I'm having a miserable time with them myself. It feels as if we have very little legal rights to do something about their blatant lies.

Brown_Eyed_Girl

I'd follow up with another email saying that unless you receive a satisfactory response to your previous email by X, then you will consider raising an official complaint.

I've only dealt with them as a potential buyer and i wasn't overly impressed. Not least when they put me on a text alert system regularly telling me about me "dream new house, available for viewings this weekend" - three times my budget.

dwill1503

Yes we will wait until its done and Im not entirely sure what we want. They have already offered us money to compensate for the broken blind we had to replace. I guess we want recognition that the have been pretty rubbish and like you, there are so many lies. Not just omissions or errors but lies.

It has been all of the ones we have dealt with in the one office. There seems to be one good lady but we don't get to speak with her - since we agreed on a sale she has disappeared and we now get the junior/rubbish ones.

They really are a necessary evil!!

dwill1503

Ironically, we used them to buy the house 8 years ago and they were bad then too. Eg. they told us "the wheelie bins are replaced by communal bins that are away or servicing" - no such thing it was black bags!! So we did use them with caution and told the manager this time of our hesitation but she reassured us they had a new management etc etc. lies lies lies!

marksoton

dwill1503 wrote: »

Ironically, we used them to buy the house 8 years ago and they were bad then too. Eg. they told us "the wheelie bins are replaced by communal bins that are away or servicing" - no such thing it was black bags!! So we did use them with caution and told the manager this time of our hesitation but she reassured us they had a new management etc etc. lies lies lies!

If they were bad then why the hell did you go back for more!???

dwill1503

marksoton wrote: »

If they were bad then why the hell did you go back for more!???

Because we fell for the hard sell

They weren't our first choice and we used someone else in the beginning but the marketing was all wrong and they weren't getting the viewings.

marksoton

dwill1503 wrote: »

Because we fell for the hard sell

They weren't our first choice and we used someone else in the beginning but the marketing was all wrong and they weren't getting the viewings.

Lesson learnt there then i guess.

Personally i wouldn't bother with the time or effort of complaining, doesn't sound like you'd gain anything.

I'm currently waiting on exchange and went to about six estate agents when i was looking. Alright i was a buyer not a seller but i found the service varied massively.

Some were disinterested, some were only interested if i used their additional services etc and really tried the hard sell and two were very good.

The simple fact is the ones who were poor will never get any of my future business and i'll never recommend them to anyone. I'd say that's far more damning than any complaint letter that'll probably end up in the bin anyway.

Hoploz

Nobody, seller, buyer or EA is in a position to plan completion dates, until contracts are ready to be exchanged. Any date suggested is pie in the sky until all parties are ready. The EA probably just thought it was possible the deal could be through at that time, but really, nobody can plan anything until all the solicitors have all their answers and are satisfied with them. The 5th or the &10th of whatever month you are thinking of may come and go without the chain being ready to confirm mutually convenient dates.