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Rightmove to act over lettings adverts and fees ruling!
Rightmove is today adding a disclaimer to all its rental adverts. The move follows last week’s bombshell ruling from the Advertising Standards Authority that Your Move – and by implication, all letting agents – must detail fees in their adverts. It will no longer be enough simply to show rent when a property is advertised, with the ASA saying that this is misleading.
Whether Rightmove’s new disclaimer will, on its own, be enough to satisfy the advertising watchdog is currently unclear. However, agents will be able to include the actual fees they charge into individual listings on Rightmove. Rightmove has until now explicitly banned letting agents from showing fees in their listings. This too therefore changes from today. So far, none of the membership bodies nor the Property Ombudsman has yet issued detailed advice on how agents should deal with the fees issue. Only UKALA has so far expressed an opinion, with executive Caroline Kenny saying that including fees in adverts is not feasible for most agents. Rightmove itself has now advised agents as follows: “You may be aware of the recent Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) ruling that non-optional tenant fees and charges should be made clear in all adverts when not included in the quoted price. “The exact format of what is acceptable remains unclear and would appear to depend on the type and applicability of the tenant fees you charge. “We will be adding the following disclaimer to all rental properties on Rightmove as of Thursday, 14th March: ‘Administration fees may apply when renting a property in England, Wales or Northern Ireland. For more details, please contact the agent.’ “However, we recommend that you take appropriate advice to ensure that you comply with the ASA ruling given the specific charging model you have adopted. “Should you wish to display further detail on applicable fees, these can be included on the property’s details page within the ‘free text’ summary description on Rightmove. “If you upload your properties to Rightmove using Rightmoveplus and have any questions about how to include this additional text within a property’s details section, please contact your account manager. “If you upload your properties to Rightmove using a datafeed and have any questions, please contact your software provider.”
