Your money is protected with us

It is imperative that all renters can trust their agent in protecting their money.

A crucial part of any property agent’s role is to look after money on behalf of their clients, who must be able to trust that they are properly protected.

Ringley is a member of the RICS Clients Money Protection Scheme. This gives all our customers the peace of mind that their rent and deposit monies are in safe hands. Unfortunately, there are a small number of agents who are not so stringent.

It is always the case

In 2018, an Essex estate agent was disqualified from managing companies for five years after she failed to put in place safeguards for £28,000 of tenants’ deposits and rent destined for landlords.

Jane Hipkin Russell’s residential sales and lettings agency went into liquidation in August of that year. Investigators from the Insolvency Service found that she, as sole director, had failed to comply with all of the legislation that required all tenant deposits to be placed in a recognised scheme.The company had no record of eleven deposits that totalled £12,000 that had been received between March and August 2018. As well as this, none of the deposits received between April 2017 and August 2018 totalling £20,000, had been paid into a government-backed statutory deposit protection scheme.

In addition, the company received just over £7,000 of rent from tenants between March and August 2018. These monies should have been paid over to the landlords but was, instead, spent on the business's general running costs. In total there were more than £28,000 worth of losses to tenants and landlords.

To see how we can help, please go to our rental portal, www.planetrent.co.uk