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OFT bans Essex estate agent

22 September 2006    138/06

The OFT has made a prohibition order against an Essex estate agent banning him from estate agency work.

Martin Geoffrey Harvey was an employee of Spicer McColl Estate Agents in Clacton-on-Sea, but is no longer employed by them. At Chelmsford Crown Court on 10 June 2004, he was sentenced to twelve months imprisonment in respect of offences under the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act.

The OFT decided to ban Mr Harvey after receiving information about the convictions from his former employer and concluding that he was unfit to carry on estate agency work.

Christine Wade, OFT Director of Consumer Regulation and Enforcement said:

‘When choosing an estate agent, consumers need to know that they are honest and trustworthy. If agents engage in any form of fraudulent conduct, the OFT will take action to prevent them working in the profession.’

NOTES

1. The OFT can take action with a view to banning from estate agency work a person (and for the purposes of the Estate Agents Act this can also be a company or a partnership) who has been convicted of 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 1979 and its associated regulations ('the Act'), or who has engaged in specified undesirable practices, if an adjudicator finds that the person in question is unfit to act as an agent.

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 Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.

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

4. An adjudicator determined that Mr Harvey was unfit to carry on estate agency work generally. A Prohibition Order was made in respect of Mr Harvey on 9 August 2006. The Order did not come into operation until the period in which any appeal could be made under section 7(1) of the Act had expired. Mr Harvey had until 6 September 2006 to lodge such an appeal but did not do so.

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 Act 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/or 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.

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