Complaints to Fair Trading – what counts as evidence?

Mrs K – I thought I’d share one of my experiences before your post drops off the bottom of the list.

Your problem, and indeed mine, is in my opinion due to the Department of Fair Trading permitting the numbers of its enforcement and investigatory staff to decline to the extent that it’s now forced to rely on telephone investigations, with an overt emphasis on achieving either a mediated outcome or a stalemate where the matter reduces to one person’s version of the events against that of the other holding contrary views.

My conclusion arises from a past complaint against the Licensee of a Real Estate Agency, who was subsequently “investigated” by an Officer of the Department who later admitted to me that he encouraged the Licensee to submit documentation that he knew would allow him to then “close” that investigation.

The Fair Trading Officer initially refused to discuss the issues with me due to “privacy”, but when I read him contradictory documentation earlier received from the Licensee, he complained about his workload and a backlog of complaints and then verbally admitted that the Licensee’s more recent documentation was post-dated, but that he would nonetheless consider my compliant closed. 

That wasn’t good enough for me, so I began contacting the Corporate HQ of the Franchise held by the Licensee, and was eventually able to speak with the “minder” to the CEO, who arranged for her boss to contact me several days later.

I got a fairly sympathetic hearing from the CEO, who offered to contact the Licensee in order to get her side of the story (there are always two sides) and to then contact me again.

I have never been able to ascertain the whole story, but when the CEO contacted me again I gained the impression that when he telephoned the Licensee (his Franchisee) he received some of the same attitude that I experienced and complained about, but in any event, he simply stated… “I don’t want that person wearing my shirt; leave it to me”.

The outcome was that the Licensee’s franchise was terminated!

So after all that, I’d suggest that if the Agent that you’re complaining about is a Franchisee of a Corporate Group (many are), then try an approach to them instead of wasting your time with under-resourced public sector bureaucrats.

One small problem here – Fair Trading doesn’t adjudicate.  All they can do is provide an opportunity for mediation – an obligatory first step before going to NCAT (formerly the CTTT).

Now, Frans, who are you really angry at?