Management Pack

Jabcat64

Hi, first time on here. I had a Leasehold sale of my flat fall through earlier this year and now in the throes of selling again. I have already paid £200 for a Management Pack for the sale that fell through. I am now being asked to pay for it again; another £200.00. Can someone confirm if they know if this is correct., ie., do I have to pay for a new pack each time. It doesn't seem fair to me!

AFF8879

It’s normally valid for 6 months. So if you received it on or before April/May time then you’ll need to pay for another one.

Waunakee

Management packs are valid for only a limited period of time.

We were in a similar position after an apartment sale fell through.I think the original pack was around £150+VAT.

We fully expected to part with the same amount again but our managing agent only charged us a nominal fee for the time it took for her to complete the amendments once we had a new buyer in place.

NameUnavailable

Another joy of leasehold!

The charge is quite fair, given that they can ask almost what they want - many are circa £500.

The worst thing is that there's no legal requirement to provide any information, which effectively traps people unable to sell at all!

eddddy

Jabcat64 said:

Hi, first time on here. I had a Leasehold sale of my flat fall through earlier this year and now in the throes of selling again. I have already paid £200 for a Management Pack for the sale that fell through. I am now being asked to pay for it again; another £200.00. Can someone confirm if they know if this is correct., ie., do I have to pay for a new pack each time. It doesn't seem fair to me!

In legal terms, the charge for providing a Management Pack is usually regarded as an 'Administration Fee'.

Presumably, no fees are mentioned in the lease for doing this.

The law says Admin Fees must be 'reasonable' - i.e. they should reflect the costs of the freeholder/management company. In the past, tribunals have accepted that about £60+vat per hour is 'reasonable' for admin work.

So if the first management pack took about 2.5 hours of admin work to complete - £200 is probably reasonable.

If the second management pack took about 2.5 hours of admin work - then another £200 might be reasonable. But if, say, it only took 30 mins to make a few changes to the first pack £200 probably isn't reasonable.


If you feel strongly enough, you can ask the freeholder to justify the second £200 charge, and say that if they don't reduce it, you will pay under protest and then challenge it at tribunal. (That may or may not persuade them to reduce it.)

But to go to tribunal, it's vital that you haven't told the freeholder that you agree to pay the charge - ideally you should make it clear that you're paying under protest. If your solicitor has already paid the charge without protest, that might have scuppered your chances.