OFT bans East Yorkshire estate agent

36/09 27 March 2009

The OFT has issued a prohibition order against an East Yorkshire estate agent banning him from engaging in estate agency work.

Mark Frederick Howe, of Beech and Howe Estate Agency, in Driffield, East Yorkshire, has been banned after convictions for offences involving fraud and dishonesty.

Howe, 43, was sentenced to ten years imprisonment at Leeds Crown Court on 31 October 2008 on 13 counts of theft, procuring execution of a valuable security by deception, obtaining property by deception, and three counts of obtaining a money transfer by deception.

Mike Haley, OFT Director of Consumer Protection, said:

'The seriousness of the offences in this case demonstrates a clear unfitness to engage in estate agency work. We will take action to ban estate agents in any case where they have committed serious offences including fraud or other dishonesty.'

NOTES

1. The OFT can bar from estate agency work a person who has committed certain specified offences such as fraud, or other dishonesty or violence; or who has committed racial or sexual discrimination in the course of estate agency work; or who has failed to comply with the requirements placed on estate agents by the Estate Agents Act and is unfit to carry on estate agency work.

2. Before a Prohibition Order is issued, the person concerned has the right to make representations to the OFT as to why the Order should not be made. If these representations are unsuccessful, subsequent appeal can be made to the Tribunals Service, an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice, on behalf of the Secretary of State.

3. Adjudicators issue and determine Prohibition and Warning Notices under the Estate Agents Act. They do so on behalf of the OFT, but make individual and independent decisions on fitness based upon the contentions in a Notice, the evidence attached to a Notice and the representations of those to whom the Notices are addressed. Representations may be made in writing and at an oral hearing.

4. An adjudicator determined that Mr Howe was unfit to carry on estate agency work. Prohibition Orders were made on 24 February 2009. Mr Howe was given 28 days to appeal but has not exercised this right.

5. After an Order has been made, the person affected can at any time, and on payment of a fee, currently £2,500, apply to the OFT for the Order to be varied or revoked.

6. The Estate Agents Act 1979 covers anyone who, in the course of business, is engaged in 'estate agency work'. This means introducing to someone else a person who wishes to buy, sell or lease land or property, and being involved in negotiating the subsequent deal. The work must be in the course of business, whether as employer or employee, and as a result of instructions from a client. The land or property may be commercial, industrial, agricultural or residential. This does not include acting as a letting agent.

7. A public register of Prohibition Orders is kept by the OFT at Fleetbank House, 2-6 Salisbury Square, London EC4Y 8JX.

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