Purplebricks is set to complain to the Advertising Standards Authority about its long-standing adversary, Chris Wood.
Wood, who is himself awaiting the formal resolution to complaints he has made to the ASA about Purplebricks, has now been confronted with a challenge to a video on his company website.
Purplebricks head of communications Nicola Hamilton has written to Wood to complain about “misleading statements” made on the video.
She says: “You make various claims which you do not substantiate and which we believe to be false and misleading. You also use the basis of an average selling price to claim you can achieve more for property.”
Wood has been given until next Monday to respond to the letter.
However, he has already done so – and in typically robust manner.
He said: “I am sorry that you felt there was a lack of substantiation on my website which I have now rectified … I will happily supply the full data to the ASA if you remain unsatisfied.”
Wood also uses the letter to ask Purplebricks to supply evidence as to its sales, and to pursue a number of points he is continuing to raise, including about registration for anti-money laundering
By apparent coincidence, Wood has also received a warning from Propertymark NAEA – to whom he has also put his allegations – suggesting he has not filled in some paperwork.
It says:
Dear Mr Wood
Re: Money Laundering Regulations – PDQ Estates Limited
We have on a number of occasions requested that all Propertymark Regulated companies, excluding those that are purely involved in residential lettings, complete our AML & CTF Questionnaire; our records currently indicate that we have not received a Questionnaire from the aforementioned company.
The purpose of this request, is to ascertain the level of compliance being observed by our members, in order that we can provide advice and support where required.
For your peace of mind, we will not conduct any disciplinary investigations based on the responses received, nor will we provide details of your individual responses to any other party. However, we will have no alternative but to view any business that fails to return a completed questionnaire as one that represents a higher risk of non-compliance.
In view of the above, we would be grateful if you as a Principal, Partner or Director could, or request that an appropriate member of staff within your business, completes and returns our questionnaire at your earliest convenience.
We look forward to hearing from you shortly.
Comments (33)
P*rplebricks in my view are akin to a plaque of locusts, they seek easy pickings, then move on …powered by those in the “get rich quick” virtual business academy
Well done Chris & Co… any action that shines a light on the apparent “magic of P*rplebricks” gets my vote.
We have just had the best review, from a PB vendor.
Our agency “were the agents for the vendor of the house we were buying. Our own agents were Purple Bricks, and although they did save us money it is very evident that you get what you pay for with estate agents. Rachel conducted our viewing and negotiations, and was professional, helpful and refreshingly not a pushy salesperson. Helen handled the sale through to completion and worked extremely hard to ensure that the sale was moving and completed before the deadline set further up in the chain. Our solicitors (via PB) were extremely slow, provided atrocious service and jeapordised the entire chain transaction. PB’s aftercare is very limited and in our situation if there hadn’t have been Helen on the phone every day pushing things along I am doubtful that we would have been able to complete. Putting a house on the market for the first time, we didn’t understand the complications a chain can cause, and the importance of the aftercare you receive from the agent to ensure that the transaction goes smoothly, and Helen at Harvey Scott was excellent in providing aftercare for her client. We are hoping for this to be our forever home but if we chose to move again in future Harvey Scott would be our first port of call. I didn’t give them 5 stars purely because we did feel the house was slightly over valued, which is probably why it was on the market for a few months.”
P.S. Price was vendor led…
Brutal that they marked you down for that!!
It’s just bullying Chris from Purplebricks. Their day will come when they get exposed.
They shut down google and Facebook reviews , yet are happy to spend millions in their adverts and TV interviews promoting the fact that they are the most reviewed estate agent in the UK! Something just doesnt sit comfortably with me and the ‘special relationship’ that they have with trustpilot.
I’ve heard other agents who are not getting the same special treatment that PB are getting.
These TV adverts are placed in advance, so they appear to be confident that there is going to be glowing reviews waiting for the next customer to read.
PB has brought to the spotlight the unethical practices of Trustpilots ease at removing unfavourable reviews and making it extremely difficult for unsatisfied customers to air their views.
There are many PLC companies on trustpilot, were reviews are not just helping to win new business, but also influence their share values.
Could manipulating customer reviews from ‘friendly’ review sites be illegally Inflating the value of PLC companies?,
Perhaps this is story for panarama to investigate.
Excellent points. Cynical manipulation of review sites, cynical marketing…..they are clearly carried out to achieve a goal!
How can any company be “Propertymark Regulated” – their self-important capitals, not mine? Propertymark is not a regulator, never has been and never should be. It’s just a private company virtually no consumer has ever heard of run by a bunch of self-important nobodies and has-beens. It’s about time the industry moved on and stopped wasting its money on these people. What does it actually do apart from pretend it has some sort of power to exclude people from the industry, which is what a regulator such as RICS does with surveyors or the Law Society with solicitors? All it can do is tell people they can’t be in its club any more. No great shakes there.
They completely lost any respect I had for them when;
a). They pristituted themselves by taking the money and allowing larger online lister members to openly and publicly criticise the businesses of other smaller members without saying a word.
Why should any member of the public take any notice of an organisation that allows public humiliation by some members of other fellow members?
b). They totally blocked an application for a significant role in the organisation by someone who would have stood up for what was right in the matter….the only reason being because he would have stood up for the smaller members!
I also received the email from NAEA Propertymark following a lengthy “discussion” over my membership and ability to use the NAEA Propertymark Protected logo which, prima facie only appears to be available to those who operate as practicing estate agents and not an industry adviser/trainer etc sch as myself who has no consumer clients but does have over 35 years as a Fellow and is also a FRICS and regulated by RICS. I hope we have now resolved the matter
Keep up the good work Chris. Online listers deserve to be scrutinised because of the way they try and ridicule what independents do….. whilst trying to claim they do it better, faster, cheaper…anything to gain business without telling the public the true stat everyone wants to know. What is your fee average per completed sale (FACS)?
Bullying only succeeds when other kids in the playground are indifferent to what is happening. Trust me when I say, in this case, every independent agent is right behind you.
Thank you. It’s taken two odd years of incredibly hard work by a small group of agents from right across the UK including employees, managers, an industry supplier and an MD of a well known brand, to reach a point where we are able to show that initial concerns and suspicions are now being proven well-founded (see recent ASA and Watchdog programmes etc). None of the group have any issues whatsoever with new business models or the people they employ/ recruit.
We all share one common belief that everyone in agency has a legal responsibility to obey the law as it stands. We fully acept that everyone (including myself) makes the odd, honest mistake. What appears to be happening in the call-centre model, though, is, as recently reported by Which, a systemic issue of misleading and other concerns which I am unable to publish for fear of falling foul of Ed’.
http://www.which.co.uk/news/2017/08/leading-online-estate-agents-rapped-for-misleading-claims/
Chris,
It’s good to see you have made changes to your website at long last. Can we safely assume that anything that has been removed could actually not be substantiated and was misleading?
Considering you have brought a complaint to the ASA against PurpleBricks and have encouraged others to do so, this must be highly embarrassing for you and must put a questionmark over the allegations you make on your blog too.
As the person who passed on the story to PIE in the first place, I don’t find it in the least embarrassing and, as I said, I was happy to make amendments to clarify the situation.
It IS rather embarrassing that the head of communications of a PLC is trying to find issues to discredit a small estate agency business down in West Cornwall. If that is the best they can do, it speaks volumes.
What is also rather awkward is that PB PLC are again today claiming to have fully qualified estate agents despite Mr Bruce agreeing to withdraw that claim back in January 2016.
Holding yourself out as having qualifications in order to obtain business when you do not hold any such qualifications is…..? Do please remind me of the law on this one CyberDuck.
“From Michael Bruce 25/01/2016 (edited)
Hi Chris,
Thanks for the email. I am sorry that I have taken a while to respond but I was out of the office for much of last week.
In relation to the reference to qualified again we are happy if it suits you to take out the word qualified and replace with “We give you a highly experienced and knowledgeable Local Property Expert…..”
I trust the above is in order. “
Funny, that – as Chris points out above, the claim is still being used.
From the PurpleBricks Twitter feed TODAY:
“Hi Mary, our Local Property Experts are all NAEA qualified with estate agency experience, but please do DM if you have any concerns.”
I have Tweeted .@naea_uk asking for confirmation of this.
Perhaps EYE-reading Members would like to request the same?
It would be rude not to…
Chris, you didn’t answer my question.
Can we safely assume that anything you have removed from your website cannot be substantiated and was misleading?
if you aren’t embarrassed by making unsubstantiated and misleading comments when you bring the same claims against others then you should be.
“Chris, you didn’t answer my question.”
Now THERE’S a chuffin’ kettle trying to tell a pot it’s got a black @r$£ if I’ve ever seen one!
And I think, cyberduck46 – you’ll find the answer is there in any case…
Ah, we all make mistakes.
“@PurplebrickUK Hi Mary. It’s Grace in Marketing here. I am sorry I said “all” of our LPEs are NAEA qualified. I meant to say “some” Sorry for my error.” 13.46 29/8/2017
(Good for Grace. Such a pity, though, it took several days of emails between myself and Mr Bruce before he accepted that a pre -IPO claim should be withdrawn)
No PeeBee, my question hasn’t been answered. It relates to anything that has been removed.
Getting off my train now so unlikely to check back but I doubt there’ll be a response to my question
Guess what cyberduck46? I think I am on pretty firm ground if I say that the vast majority of readers of this site could not give a flying fig whether Chris Wood answers your question or not. You see, your repetitive pro PB mantra assures most of us that you are in some way connected to the company; but unlike Chris you haven’t got the b*lls (assuming you are a chap) to declare your interest.
And before you ask, no, I am not associated with any ‘anti’ PB interest group.
So AgenyInsider, you speak for the majority of people who have created 2600 views of this thread?
I have no connection with Purplebricks and if you’d followed my posts you would have known that I am an investor and my interest in them started when i owned shares. I still follow the company and continue to collect my own data on them.
I’m also a customer as I currently am using them to sell my house.
So all in all I know a lot about the company both as an investor and a customer.
How long have you been on the market cyberduck46? Have you had your second price reduction yet?
Many of us have received the same email from propertymark, who told me they think the originals went into spam folders as so many do not appear to have received them!
Since alerting PIE to this story, I am very happy to make it clear that the NAEA form was, indeed, coincidental and (as many might expect) my HMRC registration was, and remains, up to date.
One of the questions I have asked of Purplebricks PLC is the statement made by the CEO, Mr Bruce, on the BBC MoneyBox program that they complete on 88% of all their listings.
Chris
Here is one statistic . Bricks have 6 properties currently available in Aberystwyth and 5 mile radius. 33 % of which have been listed for 2 years or longer and another one of these is about to reach its second year of unsoldness in a couple of months time.!
It was a tad quiet last Friday afternoon so I took the opportunity to check on Rightmove to see how many PB properties there were. 4975 including SSTC, half of these were up to £180,000 and 80% were up to £300,000, so I wonder what the actual saving really is as! Today, there are only 2956 PB properties now being advertised on Rightmove, so, over the bank holiday weekend, half of their stock disappeared.
Odd that today on PB’s own website, they are showing 31,860 of which 16142 are not SSTC, yet they tell their clients their property will go on RM.
Perhaps listings appearing on rightmove are being manipulated to save on RM fees, a virtual office fee being charged for ?every 38 listings?
Great way of saving money but not great for the properties owners are trying to sell!
Peter
I think you will find your Rightmove check is somewhat lacking.
PurpleBricks currently have 20+ Rightmove Accounts based upon ‘Regions’
Zoopla have a more complete listing total – but it does not take into account the “SSTC” element and instead shows 16,000-odd properties.
It seems that once it goes SSTC the default setting is that it is removed from Zoopla (but NOT Rightmove, strangely…).
Hence all ‘fall-throughs’ appear back on Z as ‘New Listings’ with no prior listing history!
Thanks for putting me in the know PeeBee.
Always a pleasure… never a chore!
It’s extremely interesting that so many in our industry have such an interest in the PB “Numbers Game”.
The daily ups & downs sometimes defy logic.
Amend to the above
The word “sometimes” is probably the most inappropriate in the dictionary and should be completely disregarded.
Pee Beeis right Zoopla is probably more accurate if you filter out and make some deductions for the recyclers For example with a few days to the end of the month it looks like they will have taken on about 4.700 / 4800 new instructions for August This accords with their guidance for the current FY
Nice one chris. Maybe agents should stop giving ONtheMArket their money and pay it to a fund to help you.
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