While there appears to have been only one successful prosecution brought under Consumer Protection Regulations, reported last week by EYE, there have been “hundreds or maybe thousands of ex gratia payments”.

These payments have been quietly made by agents to disgruntled buyers and tenants who “wasted time and money pursuing a property only to find out some material fact that they should have been informed about at the outset”.

The payments will have been made to consumers on the basis of signing non-disclosure agreements in settlement.

The deals keep both agents and consumers happy: the former because they are kept out of court, and the latter because while agents face hefty penalties should they be successfully prosecuted, consumers do not themselves directly benefit.

The revelations come today from compliance expert Michael Day, of consultancy firm Integra, who warns that agents must take CPRs seriously.

He describes the old concept of caveat emptor – buyer beware – as being not quite dead but certainly terminally ill.

Agents must become “much more vigilant in seeking out and obtaining information than they may have been previously”, says Day.

Failure to disclose something about a property which could affect a consumer’s decision – not just to make an offer or commission a surveyor or conveuancer, but to view – could cost agents dear.

Day backs TPO’s advice which is – if in doubt, disclose it anyway.

There are fines of up to £5,000 per offence at Magistrates Court, but fines are unlimited at Crown Court. Prison sentences of up to two years are also possible.

Mike Day is EYE’s latest new expert contributor and his column appears immediately below.