Central Office

Dear Elizabeth

Thank you for your post. I would like to answer your queries as much as possible on this forum.

I fully appreciate that many people have contributed their time, free of charge, to the AIIC over the years which has helped to bring it to the successful organisation that it is today. I feel Pat contributed greatly and I was very happy to be working with her on the committee also volunteering my time. I remember being present at the AGM where it was proposed that Pat should receive some recompense for her time which was agreed at £250 per month. I think I may have even voted in favour!

My concerns arose in relation to the expenses on the training courses, not in relation to the regular chairman’s fee which was agreed by members at the AGM. After going through the bookkeeping I found a payment for £385 to Solutions4Inventories, Helen’s company. At the council meeting that we requested in April, I queried this payment with Helen and asked her to explain the way the online courses were structured. Helen told me that anyone who registers on the AIIC website for a course is automatically redirected to Solutions4Inventories website who then took over payment and all other details. The AIIC received no commission or details of the people who completed the course unless they applied for their “free 1 year membership” after completion. This was all confirmed in person by Helen to everyone present at the meeting. The AIIC never received a penny for any online training courses that they advertised. This was the structure set up by Pat and Helen.

We have a spreadsheet clearly showing the breakdown of the fees claimed for the training courses from when Pat and Helen ran them. We will circulate this at the upcoming AGM. However, for clarification, after candidates paid for the course, expenses were claimed. The venue was paid and printing of the workbooks, which are the usual expenses for a course. Pat and Helen then charged £50 for the CD of templates, of which 10% went back to the AIIC i.e. £5, Pat received £10 for each book given out and the AIIC received £5. This then left the net profit figure from which the AIIC received 15%. To put this in more real terms, for a training course with 20 delegates paying £385 per person the AIIC received £720 and Pat and Helen received £4,080.00. There were no hourly time sheets or fixed day rates, whatever the net profit was the AIIC received 15% and Pat and Helen split the balance.

At the council meeting in April, we raised our concerns with these figures. Both myself and Danny said that we felt Pat should continue to run the courses but the pricing structure needed changing as it was not in the best interests of the AIIC or their members. We also discussed who owned the intellectual property rights to the courses, Pat said these were her courses and she could withdraw them at any time. Again we questioned whether this was structured in the best interests of the AIIC.

With regards to the deletion of emails, we received access to the web application and all inboxes, sent items, deleted items etc were empty. Due to the type of email web application that was being used we have been unable to recover any emails. We have no details of any correspondence that went before us.

As mentioned in my previous post, we have no copies of any correspondence with service providers, i.e. insurers, the PRS etc. We have had to track back and contact these organisations to try to piece together the full structure.

With regard to a certain winner in the clerk of the year award they have been told that there can be no joint advertising, conflict of interest on any property and must operate in separate manners at all times. We do understand the need for larger companies in our market place to explore and operate other avenues, on a totally separate basis and with honour and dignity.

Both myself and Danny wish to be totally transparent to all our members and are happy to answer any questions put to us at the upcoming AGM in March.

I hope I have answered your questions, however should you require any further information please feel free to contact me via Central Office.

Kind Regards,

Emma Glencross

Dear Members,

We have had some super interest with this petition and large companies such as No Letting Go have now jumped on board with their support.

We have had calls from a large London borough and a Landlord association that we are meeting with as well as discussions Generation Rent.

All very interesting.

Please do circulate and get this signed.

A very obvious boost for protecting all parties within a tenancy agreement as well as for our industry.

Of course this will also tidy up any rouge reporting and bad marks within our profession currently bringing us down.

Click this link to see our petition and start sharing it:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/203746

Petition: Make independent inventory reporting of privately rented properties compulsory
petition.parliament.uk
Independent inventory reporting of privately rented properties on an AST should be a mandatory requirement. Independent inventories offer protection and help to reduce the number of deposit disputes. Please support this petition and help us make the letting process more transparent for all.

Best Wishes,

Danny Zane & Emma Glencross

Hi,

We hear you.

We are in talks with the other representatives of the property markets.

It is not acceptable that agents compile reports for their clients. It is no skin off their noise if we are the party to be putting in place reports, that are unbias.

In this current market place we not only need a boost ourselves but it is the next obvious step for the housing minister to push forward to protect All parties and their deposits and or property, in our opinion. Instead of signing deposits over with no factual impartial evidence to be produced.

We have seen further evidence of those representing property owners compiling reports themselves, perhaps to make extra money; this needs to stop and is placing inventory reporting in a bad light.

This does not need to be any conflict and the meetings we have attended all show that agents and the heads of this sector all wish for the same thing; further regulation.

Many thanks; we understand there will be many opinions from our many valued members.

Best Wishes,

Danny Zane