New body policing estate and letting agents to have budget of £740,000 a year

The new enforcement body for lettings agents is advertising for a new ‘intelligence officer’ who will lead enforcement in England.

The advert offers a salary of between £24,799 and £26,999 on the basis of a one-year contract with the possibility of extension subject to funding. The job description says the post will involve working from home, but a lot of travel and frequent overnight stays.

https://www.ehn-jobs.com/job/323692/intelligence-officer-lead-enforcement-authority-lettings-england-/

The advert has appeared as more details have been given about the new body that will be policing estate agents in the UK and letting agents in England.

The National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency Team currently has 12 members of staff plus two part-time contracted adjudicators. Seven full-time officers plus the part-time adjudicators work at Powys, with four staff members at Bristol, and the team leader covering both sites.

A spokesperson said: “Working closely with our colleagues at the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government, we will keep demands and capacity under review on an ongoing basis.

“We should also emphasise that the bulk of letting agency enforcement work will continue to be delivered by local authorities across England through their own resources.”

The overall funding for the new combined body will be £740,000 a year, with the estate agency function – operated by Powys County Council – having the same budget as last year.

The £740,000 does not include an unspecified sum provided by MHCLC to cover start-up costs and training.

It can also be revealed that the tender for letting agency enforcement was put out to all local authorities in England.

There were three bids, with the eventual winner being Bristol City Council.

The contract is worth £240,000 to Bristol in the first year, with additional funding to cover start-up costs and training.

Finally, EYE asked if the new body will be known by an acronym, as NTSEAT was. If so, the acronym would be NTSELAT.

However, the spokesperson said: “While we can’t avoid people using the acronym, we will refer to the team as we would refer to other National Trading Standards (NTS) teams.

“This would be in full before abbreviating it to the NTS Estate and Letting Agency Team.”

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6 Comments

  1. ArthurHouse02

    £740,000???? Thats nothing in the grand scheme of things. If they are doing their job even vaguely well, that money will be gone in a couple of months.

    As usual its all just PR spin to make people think the government are doing something. The budget should have been £5-10 million pounds.

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  2. JonnyBanana43

    £25,000 a year. Hardly going to attract high flyers to do a proper job. Most Negs are on more than that!

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    1. DarrelKwong43

      There are other jobs for around £35k …which is about 8k above national average.

      I would do it for commission, I would make a mint 🙂

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      1. Mark Walker 2

        “I would do it for commission” – was that a sly dig? 😉

         

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  3. Will2

    Seeking the highest quality staff then!

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  4. Property Ear

    A nice little number for Chris Grayling?
    PS – In the same way estate agents have to pay to be detectives for HMRC and fund the Property Ombudsman, will we all have to chip in to pay this watchdog too?
    It’s only fair we should, after all, we’re all making a mint in the few hours left in a working week having looked after our many compliance obligations.
     

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