A new repair reporting system is due to launch into the lettings market this month.
Called LettingFix, it is currently in beta testing mode with a few agents and is designed to cut down on soaring maintenance costs in rental properties and also the number of calls that tenants make about repair issues.
It is the brainchild of Invento Software, which has an inventory-creation app called LettingCheck.
The new product will allow tenants to post repair requests online, including pictures, and let them keep track of what is going on, while the agent decides the best course of action.
While it will be a competitor to the hugely successful Fixflo, it says that it does have some differentiators.
These include integration between LettingCheck and LettingFix, allowing repair problems to be reported while an inventory is being carried out. The new product will also have a mobile app for letting agents.
However, like Fixflo, the new system will allow tenants to report repair issues in a number of languages – in the case of LettingFix, 40 of them, with each one being human translated to ensure accuracy.
Invento says that repair costs are spiralling in the private rented sector because so many agents are sending out maintenance staff to deal with minor issues that tenants could have dealt with themselves.
It says that unnecessary maintenance calls have risen 37% since 2005.
Managing director Louis Harwood, pictured, said: “Many letting agents have told us that they’ve been asked just to change a lightbulb for their tenant.”
News of the launch comes in the week when the Lords are due to debate an amendment on ‘retaliatory evictions’ – where tenants ask for repairs to be made and are then told to leave. The amendment would require agents and landlords to respond to requests within 14 days or forfeit their right to serve notice under the Section 21 procedure.
Comments (2)
Re “Many letting agents have told us that they’ve been asked just to change a lightbulb for their tenant” – clearly those letting agents had failed to do their job in explaining to tenants what their obligations are from the start which is worrying and I am not sure I would want to trust those agents with or without this Fix
Lightbulb? Really? So how competent are these people? Do they not employ people with common sense. Spending landlords money does not sit well with most of them so it seems to me that some agents need to learn how to say no.