Aspirant new trade body CIELA (the Charter for Independent Estate and Letting Agents) now says it will launch on April 2 – six months later than it had hoped.
It has decided to drop its opposition to the lettings fee ban.
Instead, it sees its new role as policing the industry.
It says that no other organisation is doing this effectively.
According to CIELA, the number one concern among agents is the public’s negative impression of the industry, “caused by the illegal conduct of many small independent agents, compounded by the Government’s failure to enforce existing laws and further worsened by the failure of any existing organisation to take effective action”.
CIELA will provide a free downloadable “certificate of integrity” for compliant agents and also provide a “snitching” facility for agents to anonymously report firms not following regulations.
CIELA blamed its previous failure to launch on lack of support.
It admits it still needs increased support and new members.
After the diatribe that this lot have put out over the last year has got them nowhere, I would have thought they would have given up by now.
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I’ve never heard the collective sound of 17000 estate agents not caring at once . It’s quite eerie
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This lot have been flogging a dead horse for months. Let it go guys. Let it go.
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The name might mis-lead the public into believing this organization has been granted a Royal Charter such as the RICS – was that the intention?
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I know a couple of people involved in this, and they are decent people, and good agents, but I don’t like the idea of them “policing the industry”. They are not law or rule makers, they have no power over me and my company, I can do what I want within the law, I don’t need their approval or consent. And with a continued lack of support and members after over a year and all this PR, it seems little more than a poor mans OTM – meaning well, but going nowhere.
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It is a shame that the supporters of CIELA have apparently hitched their wagon to this non-starter. Charlie Wright- who also goes by the name of Charles Lamdin -has a history of failed and wound up companies behind him, as the most simple of searches of Companies House reveals.
He seems to be big on talk and little on substance. So what are his qualifications to act as industry regulator?
Incidentally – what’s happened to all the money collected in subscriptions so far?
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It is Mr ‘Lamdin’ who is in fact named at Companies House as Director of CIELA.
You have to dig deeper to find Mr Wright’s previous Directorial history.
A LOT deeper.
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Why someone would hold directorships under two names, I wonder?
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And several Director Identification Reference Numbers as well?
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Well a quick google can be revealing. 😉 The internet age, innit.
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