Peverel was given a clean bill of health by an “independent audit” and was boasting of its improved services to ARMA – the Association of Residential Managing Agents – just days after admitting a price-fixing scam to the OFT.
On January 4 2010, then Peverel managing director Lee Middleburgh wrote in a “proactive step” an open letter to the chairman and members of ARMA.
He did so after Peverel’s County Estate Management division had just been fined £2,500 in connection with complaints about its activities at Westside One, in Birmingham, and at Charter Quay, in Kingston, where a court had removed Peverel as manager.
In the letter to ARMA members, Middleburgh attributed the problems to Peverel’s taking over of Solitaire and County Estates Management, both of which were absorbed into the Tchenguiz empire earlier than Peverel.
“In the Autumn of this year, working with ARMA, we underwent an independent audit of our work to date,” wrote Middleburgh.
“The audit indicated that the steps being taken showed that our new systems and processes meet the demands of customers and the service charge management code fully. In no area were specific additional requirements highlighted.”
Peverel’s fine work in the “personal development, training and education” of employees had just won Peverel an Investors in People accreditation in November 2009 – just as the price-fixing scandal was hitting the pages of national newspapers.
Cirrus, the door entry and warden call service at the centre of the price-fixing scandal, won a National Business Award for “employer of the year” in November 2009 – the month before it admitted cheating pensioners to the OFT.
(Campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation has contacted the National Business Awards scheme to see whether being disgraced by an OFT investigation means Cirrus will have to return the award.)
Needless to say, ARMA eagerly swallowed Middleburgh’s explanations, announcing in a tiny aside in its newsletter of January 2010, that while County Estate Management had been “severely admonished and fined £2,500”:
“ARMA has taken this action in the light of historic problems inherited by the current owners and management team. ARMA is satisfied that real progress is being made by the new management team to address these historic problems.
“Members are referred to a recent open letter sent to them by Lee Middleburgh.”
At the same time Middleburgh shared his thoughts in an uncritical interview to readers of Flat Living magazine (which shares directors with Residents Line insurance).
“We don’t set out to be big. We set out to deliver good service, to forge relationships and seek to find common ground when dealing with disputes and difficult issues.”
A great shame he did not add:
“And we have just confessed to running a sham tendering process with Cirrus to the OFT which has cheated retired residents of tens of thousands of pounds.”
Lee Middleburgh’s letter of January 4 2010 to the ARMA membership can be read here:
Related posts:
Cooee! Peverel becomes FirstPort and heading for ARMA-Q … But will it be welcome?
If Peverel Retirement is admitted to ARMA-Q, what message does that send thousands of cheated pensioners?
Peverel cheated pensioners in £1.4 million tenders at 65 sites, says OFT
Peverel-Cirrus tee-hee email: Cheating oldies is ‘not an official part of the process (tee hee)’
Peverel Retirement up before the ARMA regulator before it can join ARMA-Q
Guardian report pours scorn on OFT price-fixing investigation – and Peverel’s contemptible £100,000 ‘goodwill’ offer
Excellent reporting. Well done. You just couldn’t make this up could you? It’s Orwellian. These people take their customers to be idiots.
Customers? Sorry, hostages–they were appointed by the landlord without any reference to the customer in most cases.
If ARMA doesn’t expel Peverel for this disgusting display of cynicism it will prove once and for all that it is a completely contemptible, useless and corrupt organisation. I won’t hold my breath.
I am sick to death of seeing the likes of ARMA and the OFT doing NOTHING. Thats right, you just couldn’t make this up could you?
If ARMA doesn’t expel Peverel for this disgusting display of cynicism it will prove once and for all that it is a completely contemptible, useless and corrupt organisation. And then we have the OFT running on taxpayers money – you couldn’t make it up – must be a great life guys, but how do you sleep at night?
signed Trevor Bradley, Director of a small Management Co that would rather close down if ever it became compulsory to become a member of the likes of ARMA etc etc.
The problem that you might not see is that ARMA are auditing the Agent. As you can see, the ownership, control, various miscreants and the job hopping senior personnel, are often interlinking outside the agent, and outside the reach of the audit.