Unpleased Tenant said about John German

Services : Letting( As a Tenant )Date: 12th Jun 2014

The initial contact with John German was very positive, right up until the first day of tenancy, the viewing and application process all went smoothly.
Having got the first load of items in the rental van to the new house, I went to the office at the per-arranged time to pick up the keys was where it all started to go wrong. I waited and met the correct person, "so Sir, how are you going to pay the security deposit and first months rent?". We had already transferred this as requested, which I informed the agent of. After going off into the back office for a while they confirmed this, so all was OK - no big issue really. Then, sorry you can't have the keys yet. Despite having booked this date several weeks ago, they still haven't performed the inventory check yet. They're sending the person over shortly to do it. When will this be done? Can't really say - could be a couple of hours. Great, nice wasted time with the rental van. After some convincing they agree to do away with standard policy of us having to go back to the office again to get keys, the person doing the check-in inventory will hand them over at the end of the inspection. So, off to get a quick bit of food, then wait in the van for the inspector.
After a fair wait the inspector turns up, is quite rude (to us and about the office staff) but does the inspection, and eventually hands over the keys - 2 sets for a 3 person rental. "If we need any more, it's our responsibility". First impressions of our new house, it's quite nice, apart from the dead wasps all through the hall - neatly not noted on the inventory.

Fast forwarding through the next 3 years, there were many house inspections throughout the tenancy (fine) but some with absolutely no notice. Just turning up, in the house inspecting. Erm, what happened to the minimum 24 hours notice? "Oh, not everyone's been getting our emails." Even though I'd received emails from them either side of the inspection about other "marketing" topics. Any problems notified to the office (such as clearly there's a wasp nest in the loft, the pantry roof is leaking) don't get fixed unless you call and call....

Now we get towards the end of the tenancy, (we've handed in our notice at this point) and whilst we're in the house doing our final big clean on a Saturday, an agent and perspective tenant show up in the house. Erm, excuse me, why are you in our house? Oh, I'm here with a viewing. I was in yesterday and I'll be back in on Monday too. On this instance we call to complain, and to their credit we are apologised to, but that doesn't last long.

Trying to arrange the check-out visit was made a huge hassle, and invariably made it impossible for any of us to attend the "Check-out visit". Well over a week of calling the office multiple times per day and not one one single occasion is it possible for me to be put through to someone who can arrange the visit or my messages get passed on to someone who can arrange the check-out to call me back and arrange it. Eventually I manage to call and be put through to the apparently one and only person capable of booking the check-out, but to be told any dates I can do are now unavailable ("You should have contacted me a few days ago") and apparently 1 week (including a bank holiday) is too far in advance to do the check-out, so they'll have to do it without us.

It takes them four weeks after the check-out to let us know how much they want to deduct from our deposit (not much, but includes some ridiculous cleaning items), and they fail to see how having had multiple unauthorised entries to our property (which we found out about from neighbors and they later confirmed) could have impacted some deductions like a bit of tiled floor needing cleaning. Things we would have taken the time to check and rectify had we known people had been going in and out of the house. Notwithstanding the fact that they had been making un-notified entries to the property even though it was "our responsibility" until the check-out date - they had apparently decided they were allowed free access to it.

In all communication with them about the whole affair, we have been dealt with as children to be chastised; far from the professional paying customer treatment I've received from other letting agents.

All in all - avoid at all costs

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