PM has subscribed me to a "free trial"

B

beachgurl

In my last rental statement mail I received correspondence that I have been given a three month free trial to Barclay MIS. It appears to be a debt collection type policy where an external source chases the tenant for outstanding monies.

What bothers me is that the PM has advised that once the three month trial is over, I will then roll over to a standard policy unless I choose to "opt out" by a certain date.

Is the PM allowed to do this? I understand that they think this type of policy is great for them to offload the arrears chasing for the slumlords but the default option being an opt-out rather than an opt-in bothers me.

I wonder how many irate calls the agency will get by those who don't read all the miscellaneous advertising from agents and end up being charged for this service?

Is a bit like one of our shiny happy airlines' booking systems whereby you have to click to opt out of paying for travel insurance on domestic flights...ok cranky pants put away now.
 
Advise the PM in writing that under no circumstances are they to opt in any service without your prior written approval and in addition that it is their responsibility to advise Barclay MIS that they were in error in submitting your details and you have not subscribed to their services.
 
I'd change PM's if they tried to pull that crap on me, what a joke. I'd imagine they'd be getting kick backs.
 
beachgurl said:
I
What bothers me is that the PM has advised that once the three month trial is over, I will then roll over to a standard policy unless I choose to "opt out" by a certain date.
Click to expand...

Sounds like a great way to p*ss off your customers and hurt your business.

Cheers

Jamie
 
beachgurl said:
In my last rental statement mail I received correspondence that I have been given a three month free trial to Barclay MIS. It appears to be a debt collection type policy where an external source chases the tenant for outstanding monies.

What bothers me is that the PM has advised that once the three month trial is over, I will then roll over to a standard policy unless I choose to "opt out" by a certain date.

Is the PM allowed to do this? I understand that they think this type of policy is great for them to offload the arrears chasing for the slumlords but the default option being an opt-out rather than an opt-in bothers me.

I wonder how many irate calls the agency will get by those who don't read all the miscellaneous advertising from agents and end up being charged for this service?

Is a bit like one of our shiny happy airlines' booking systems whereby you have to click to opt out of paying for travel insurance on domestic flights...ok cranky pants put away now.
Click to expand...

This is known as a "negative sell" or "inertia selling"

inertia selling
n
1. (Commerce) (in Britain) the illegal practice of sending unrequested goods to householders followed by a bill for the price of the goods if they do not return them

The practice is illegal as far as I am aware. I'm sure there can be some grey areas in this regard which maybe they're using to keep it on the legal side but I'm not sure how.

Going back more 20 years to 1991 in the very early days of landlord insurance we actually implemented this, after about 6 months we found it was to "grey" an area even back then and despite full refund guarantees etc. it had the potential to create too many problems, so we ceased to do it.

A couple of years ago I received the same correspondence from one of my managing agents and I quickly advised them that as far as I was concerned they had no right to do it and that it was an illegal practice. There is also a definition of the practice on the ACCC website.

Blowing/inertia selling

A consumer being supplied and billed for services or goods they didn?t order. Often, the supply is accompanied by a notice telling the consumer that if the offer is not rejected within a specified time, the seller will send an invoice or debit an existing account or line of credit. A common example of blowing is a person or business receiving an invoice for entry in an advertising directory when they had not previously asked for the entry
 
It is a fundamental principle of contract law that silence cannot be construed as acceptance, i.e. you can't say "we'll have a contract unless you say otherwise".

But the PM is your agent, and legally, can do all the things that you could do, with regard to managing your property. It sounds to me that they've signed you up for Barclay MIS and have accepted the conditions on your behalf. That's appalling.
 
Dont get me started on the number of "smoke alarm maintenance" most pms practically auto sign me up for!!!

apparently $85 per year to poke at my $8 smoke alarm is terrific value!

Id rather pay my tradie $50 and tell him to put in a new one every year
 
Truly Exotic said:
Dont get me started on the number of "smoke alarm maintenance" most pms practically auto sign me up for!!!

apparently $85 per year to poke at my $8 smoke alarm is terrific value!

Id rather pay my tradie $50 and tell him to put in a new one every year
Click to expand...

Yep that's another one I've come across. And external to property, the Quickflix movie trial. Clicks you over to the paid subscription service if you don't sit in the looooong phone queue to request the subscription be cancelled.

That's interesting Perp. Makes sense.

I guess this is a tip for players to read all of your mail :) I've been quite slack of late.
 
Perp said:
But the PM is your agent, and legally, can do all the things that you could do, with regard to managing your property. It sounds to me that they've signed you up for Barclay MIS and have accepted the conditions on your behalf. That's appalling.
Click to expand...
I would be very surprised if that's the case. You have an agreement with them that sets out what they can do, it doesn't give them carte blanche to do whatever they want. There are way too many laws preventing that.
 
The facts on this

Barclays supply a service of rent retrieval from defaulting tenants that is very rarely successful but you still get charged an annual fee for the service that rarely results in gain. Remember that your PM has handed over your information now to a 3rd party without your consent, I would seriously be questioning this action.

With the smoke alarm service once again your information has been handed over to a third party without your consent. The legislation for smoke alarms is thus, and owner is reasponsible for ensuring that new batteries are installed into the smoke alarms at the beginning of each new tenancy (keep receipt) checking the used by date and replacing alarms every 10 years on the expiration (keep receipt) that is it in a nutshell. The smoke alarm companys use scare tactics to get business
 
Very concerning trend - there was another thread about ATO audit shield where they were using inertia selling. I'd suggest a quick lesson in contract law for PM's might be in order.

Silence as acceptance is invalid and inertia selling is illegal. Fodder for the ACCC
 
Makes me glad of my Adelaide PM, she sent out specific paperwork explaining the offer of smoke alarms from the company and their brochure but that was it. I agree it's appalling to have signed you up for this service without even a courtesy e-mail, let alone actual consent
 
I am shocked that your property manager has signed you up at your cost to do his job. What does his management fee cover you for? Do you have an arrears problem? What good is 3 mths free if there are no issues? These insurance companies also offer $15 kick back to the agent each yrs for policies. Has he declared this to you? You need to ring your PM and ask some serious questions!!
 
Does anybody read the privacy statement of the agency that they have signed up their management agreement with? Probably not. This is generally what you have signed yourself up for and you have consented :eek:

"For what purposes do we collect, hold, use and disclose your personal information?

We collect personal information about you so that we can perform our business activities and functions and to provide best possible quality of customer service.

We collect, hold, use and disclose your personal information for the following purposes:

to provide products and services to you and to send communications requested by you;
to answer enquiries and provide information or advice about existing and new products or services;
to provide you with access to protected areas of our website;
to assess the performance of the website and to improve the operation of the website;
to conduct business processing functions including providing personal information to our related bodies corporate, contractors, service providers or other third parties;
for the administrative, marketing (including direct marketing), planning, product or service development, quality control, survey and research purposes of Agency Name, its related bodies corporate, contractors, franchisees, franchisees? real estate agents or service providers;
to provide your updated personal information to our related bodies corporate, contractors or service providers;
to update our records and keep your contact details up to date;
to process and respond to any complaint made by you; and
to comply with any law, rule, regulation, lawful and binding determination, decision or direction of a regulator, or in co-operation with any governmental authority of any country (or political sub-division of a country)."
 
So many assumptions that are not even relatively close to correct. Any agent is required by legislation to disclose if they receive a commission or any "kick backs" for recommending specific products.

Barclay MIS is actually very useful for landlords and can save you literally hundreds of dollars should a tenant ever abandon a property. If you have a chat to your property manager then you will probably see the benefits and it certainly isn't a case of the PM passing off chasing arrears.

If anything, it's more work for your PM once you actually understand how it works rather than assumptions.

And finally, other than the rental property address (Which no doubt has been advertised on rental lists and the internet at some stage) then no personal information is given... not even a landlords first name.
 
Don't debt collection services only come into play AFTER the pm has received a judgement from OFT against the tenants and then failed to comply? IMHO it's probably better to have rent insurance and let the insurer chase any debts.

Apply the bond against lost rent and claim for damage beyond that.
 
Despite returning a "thanks but no thanks" reply to a pm I have just noticed $55 charged from Barclay MIS on a rental statement I have just received, xxxxx off and I will be calling them tomorrow for a refund. I am getting a little tired of continually having to opt out of unwelcome sales methods by others who see a cash cow
 
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