What We Don't Do
We Don't Take Referral Fees
Nearly every managing agent takes some form of referral fees for the business they place with suppliers. They see this as supplemental income for them and so never pass on these savings to the properties under their management.
We Don't Put Our Profits Before Our Clients
Each of the founding directors of Blocnet have been in your position as a property owner and, therefore, victims of the questionable business practices of many managing agents. It was our experiences and frustrations that motivated us to establish Blocnet as a credible and ethical market alternative.
We Don't Own Any Internal Insurance Brokers
There are a surprising number of cases where a property management company actually is the owner of their own insurance broker. When this is the case your insurance will be taken out through this broker and a healthy referral fee is typically passed back (without you benefiting) to the property manager. This prohibits any specific property from receiving the best insurance product for the cheapest annual premium.
We Don't Take Unethical Charges From Your Service Charge Account
Property management is an industry where almost no regulation exists. Managing agents know this and take advantage by undertaking a vast number of "sharp practices" that may be technically legal but seen by most as completely unethical, especially where service charges are concerned. At Blocnet, we ourselves have lived through the pain and hassle of being on the receiving end of such practices. We know how frustrating and expensive this can be for each property owner. As a result, we have carefully developed each of our business practices - from accounts and reporting to service charge budgets - so that they benefit each property owner and their development first and foremost.
We Don't Create Service Charge Deficits
For any development, it is an unhealthy situation if there are service charge deficits. At Blocnet, we set realistic service charge budgets and closely manage expenses to ensure your expectations are met at a minimum of cost. We work closely with RMC Directors to monitor and decide what to do with any service charge arrears that may occur as these can have a serious negative impact on your development.
Our team of experienced property management experts work hard to set attainable and realistic service charge budgets, taking into account all aspects of wear and tear, average inflation and any new or additional services that are to be implemented. In turn we�ll provide you with a detailed report on how the previous year�s service charge budget was distributed.
We're committed to making sure any service charge budgets are set correctly, with transparency at every stage, enabling owners to see where their service charge is being spent and in turn reduce the likelihood of service charge arrears developing.
We Don't Provide Unclear Information Surrounding Your Charges
Every aspect of our information system and business practices has been specifically designed to deliver clear information to each owner. As a result, we proactively deliver information that answers 99.8% of the questions an owner may have regarding any aspect of how their property in being managed.
We Don't Return Your Accounts Late
An alarming number of managing agents routinely take up to 6 months following your property's year end to prepare and produce annual accounts. This means that charges are as much as 17+ months old by the time you see them in your service charge accounts. This makes it difficult for any owner to question a specific service charge expenditure given how much time has transpired since the work was completed, and can mean future service charge budgets are set incorrectly.
We Don't Undertake Major Works Without Consulting Our Clients First
We take pride in our consultation process for major works in that we not only consult you (a legal requirement that is often not followed correctly by managing agents) but we also carefully listen to your feedback and work hard to incorporate your ideas into the final scope and specification (something that most managing agents resist doing). This approach delivers an overall solution that balances the ideas and interests of each property owner against meeting any relevant lease covenants.