The bill received royal assent on the 26th April 2013. A last minute amendment to this bill means that all private sector letting and management agents must now offer landlords and tenants access to an approved ‘redress schemes’
Further, the Office of Fair Trading will also have the power to ban agents who act improperly.
This should go some way to improving standards in the industry and protecting tenants and landlords but it has stopped short of complete industry regulation and there are some who feel that it is not enough to eliminate ‘cowboy agents’ completely.