Rightmove has responded succinctly to an open letter to its commercial director, Miles Shipside.
The open letter was published as a comment to a story on EYE last week and was from regular poster PeeBee.
The open letter expresses a query about ‘national’ agents – how Rightmove categorises online operations – which use local self-employed representatives.
It asks whether these should be signed up separately to membership of Rightmove, paying individual membership fees.
The open letter points out that Rightmove’s model for ‘traditional’ agents is to charge per branch.
We sent Rightmove the link to the open letter and received the reply: “Our geographical pricing model charges agents for virtual branches in local areas, to ensure all agents are charged consistently and fairly for the exposure they receive on Rightmove.”
For those who missed it, the full open letter is reproduced below.
OPEN LETTER TO MILES SHIPSIDE, COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR, RIGHTMOVE plc.
Dear Sir
I write on behalf of many Estate Agents up and down the country, however if you wish I am sure that via Twitter, PropertyIndustryEye, and various other connections I can, should you prefer, arrange the Principles, Directors and Owners of many, many companies to write to you separately.
You will no doubt be aware of issues that many of us in the industry have been bringing to Rightmove’s attention and requesting that action be taken, in accordance with Rightmove’s Terms and Conditions of Membership (as softened… sorry, amended… following our requests for action), namely #portaljuggling, re-listing/re-loading, false claims over ownership of the sale of a property – the list goes on.
This, for some reason, is ongoing almost a year after first notification and still it is happening day in:day out – but it is not the issue we wish to pursue here today.
The reason for this Open Letter – which seems to be the accepted new way to draw attention to issues of concern within our industry – is in respect of whether Rightmove agree that companies who employ the services of ‘Local’ Agents on a self-employed/franchised/ad-hoc basis in order to barely comply with minimum requirements of your Terms will be required to register each of these people as a profit centre/’branch’, and therefore be required to pay a separate Membership Fee for each profit centre (and discipline) advertising on your website.
My company has several branches, and offers both sales and lettings. We are charged for each branch.
My current understanding is that ‘national’ companies which have been operating from a central Call-Centre/HQ/nest or whatever they deem to term it as pay per ‘area’, per ‘X’No. properties, or similar.
There are some 3500 ‘Activity Centres’ in the UK (credit: Robert May). Many of these companies claim to cover a whole Region (sometimes encompassing several counties) by one ‘Local Property (insert name-of-the-moment)’ – and it has been evidenced that in some instances the travel time alone from one end of their ‘patch’ to the other would be in excess of three hours.
I have provided PropertyIndustryEye with evidence that one ‘National’ company is offering the services of the same ‘Local Whatever-you-want’ from North Northumberland to mid-Yorkshire – a patch extending to over 150 miles.
So, Mr Shipside – the floor is yours. Please confirm:
Do ‘National’, Centralised Office, ‘Online’, ‘Hybrid Online’ or otherwise multi-area Estate/Letting Agents currently pay per ‘Local’ presence?
If not – will they be required to do so in future?
If they will be required to do so in future, what criteria will they need to satisfy?
and
What criteria will Rightmove be setting as to their scope of operation?
I sincerely hope that you are prepared to accept this on behalf of many wanting these – and more, answers, as the above list is far from exhaustive.
In fact – I am simply scratching at the surface to test the lie of the land for communication.
I look forward to a response, Mr Shipside.
Yours sincerely
PeeBee.
And a few others.
Ranks alongside “we take portal juggling seriously” as a response.
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“Our geographical pricing model charges agents for virtual branches in local areas, to ensure all agents are charged consistently and fairly for the exposure they receive on Rightmove.”
What does that mean?, yes it is a sentence, a succinct on but it doesn’t actually say if an area Lister who is covering 120 activity centres get charged for covering 120 activity centres.
Care to succinctly explain how it actually works rather than fobbing us of with a ‘yes, yes of course it’s fair!’
Does my local listing passive intermediary get charged £800 for Barnstaple, £800 for Buanton, £ 800 for Ilfracombe, £800 for Bideford, £800 for Torrington, £800 for South Molton, £800 for Lynton, ……. there is quite a list between Bude and Taunton
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Well let’s be honest it complete b#ll#cks!
I know for a fact agents are charged different figure for the same products.
The way RM justify this is say agents have a loyalty bonus. Ask for a rate card or proof of loyalty in literature and they do not produce it.
RM make the rules as they go along, always have!
*nice nostalgic thread, moan at RM makes a difference from OTM 🙂
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Dear Rightmove
Your reply is noted.
Obviously, I need to sit and digest it thoroughly before making further, detailed, comment; however I will mirror the sentiment of another poster with my initial response as it appears quite a succinct précis of the matter:
B011ocks.
Yours, until the next time (which won’t be too long…)
PeeBee
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In my area, at my last Customer Liaison meeting (complete hard sell for new products I was not using), I was notified that due to the increase in properties I was advertising in another Post Code they would be looking at any further increase as another (invisible) branch!!!
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On a plus side bend the truth like the onliners do.
Call it a “Virtual Office” and promote the ar*e out of it!
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Rightmove are working for their shareholders
Estate agents don’t have to use Rightmove
Therefore the until the minute Estate agents find a better solution, rightmove have our Bo11ock5 is a vice and will squeeze till the pips come out.
Just saying !!!
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What a graphic analogy
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