« Henryparks » is clearly an Austin Wyatt employee, given his/her reference to the previous company name. NO - Austin Wyatt did not « sort out WSB's mess » they simply lost their loyal and KNOWLEDGABLE staff, racked up their fees, and provided the worst customer service ever.

WSB was acquired by Countrywide long before the name changed to Austin & Wyatt and all the staff resigned! We were told we could no longer use our contractors unless they signed an agreement with Countrywide that they would add 12% to their invoices. This is always passed to the landlord. The 'line' we had to use was that this was an agreement directly between the contractor and the agent and that we don't ask or expect them to pass on that fee! A fee of £25 is also added to the landlords invoice for landlords gas safety checks and electrical safety inspections. Also be aware that a fee is charged to the landlord if he doesn't want the tenancy agreement renewed but prefers it to run on a monthly basis afterwards. Considering there is no admin involved in this process, a £90 fee is very difficult to justify. Their account department is based in India too so if you have a query, it takes forever to be answered.

Well, that post reeks of an office desperately attempting to save itself from a bad reputation.

It was certainly my understanding that there were no dismissals whatsoever and that staff had all resigned due to their unhappiness with the way that Countrywide ran its business. Also, I understood that the 'new' team currently in-situ have no previous lettings experience...

As for the comment about the fees, well that's just laughable! Are your Landlords aware that you charge your contractors a commission rate of 12% which they then offset via their invoices to their landlords? Let alone all of the other hidden fees, often taken from landlords without prior consultation.