estate agent problems

[mandy123]

i was told by my estate agent thgat i can't view the records of my property he holds for me. is this true? he said it was data protrection from the tenants but its my property?

[woofgang]

I would think that you should certainly be able to know who your tenants are or had been. The man(or woman!) is acting as your agent. if you had not used an agent then you would have known the namesof your tenants because they would have been talking to you directly!

[mandy123]

I know the tenats well - i wanted to see the records because i am missing certain statements of repair work i have paid the estate agent for. when i questioned the estate agent to look through my files he said i couldnt?

how else can i confirm that i have paid for this work to be done?

[woofgang]

umm, I smell a rat. When we rented our house out we got copies of all such bills and statements!!

[brachiopod]

Quote the Data Protection Act back at him.

Undersection 7(1) of the Data Protection Act 1998, he must supply you with relevant material they hold about you (and therefore, by implication, your property).

If, for some reason, it contains personal information about other parties (eg your tenants) then this information must be obscured (eg by making a photocopy but obscuring the personal information (eg an account number / date of birth etc.) He cannot simply remove the whole document because one page happens to have this item of personal information on one line.

Separate to the DPA, since you are involved in a 'commercial transaction', you have a 'contract' with the Estate Agent, and as such, you are also entitled to some form of Bill, Statement or Receipt that sets out charges / commission / monies received / monies paid out etc.

Who is asking you to confirm the work done has been paid for - the Estate Agent? Sounds a bit dodgy to me.

If you need to see copies of documents that you have already been supplied copies of, then he is entitled to make a 'reasonable charge' for the costs incurred (time, photocopying etc) - just like a bank charges for a duplicate statement etc.

However, applying under the DPA, you will pay a fixed fee of (I think it's now) �12. They then have 40 days in which to comply with your request.