“Our relationship with MBM Property is a bit of an odd one. We lived next door to the property that we ended up renting and had agreed this with the landlord before we even spoke to MBM. However, we felt as though we were treated less favourably because of this. We had a number of issues with MBM that started from day one. The first was around the cleanliness the property - the cleaning company MBM employed did a sub-standard job of the cleaning - leaving cleaning residue all over the surfaces in the kitchen, dusty cupboards, fluff / mud on the carpet etc. so we had to clean the entire property from top to bottom on our first day. Secondly, they took incorrect meter readings at the property and passed them onto the supplier, which then generated a hugely inaccurate bill (to the tune of £200) that took us a lot of back and forth to resolve. They also passed on our contact details to a number of third party companies (insurance etc.) despite us asking them not to do so, which meant we received a number of cold calls trying to sell us something!
Because we got on so well with the landlord from living next door, we contacted them directly for any issues to see whether they wanted to resolve them before MBM's involvement - mainly due to the higher maintenance costs they charged (£80 for cleaning apparently!!!!). For us, this was much better as the work was completed quickly and to a high standard, as proven when MBM "fixed" the fence temporarily by nailing cut-offs of wood to the wall holding it up. However, these issues whilst disappointing, can be overlooked.
The main issue we have was around the attitudes of some of their staff - particularly Ashley and Kaye. Ashley made the mistake with the meter readings, then when he came round to get the correct ones, he almost forgot until I pointed it out as he was about to leave. Throughout this he seemed a little cheesed off, but at the end of the day we were the ones who could have been £200 out of pocket had it not been for a good spot on my behalf. The other issue was around the check out inspection and a recent conversation with Kaye. As MBM had clearly stated they are members of ARLA, I read ARLA's Private Rented Sector Code, specifically section 5.2, which states that as tenants we should be given reasonable notice to attend the inspection if we so wished. When I asked Kaye for specifics of our checkout (such as date and time) she was extremely rude to me and said that because we had requested to end our tenancy earlier than our standard notice period, they could not accommodate the checkout until 5 days (3 working days) after our tenancy ends (ARLA states next working day and there were 2 working days after our tenancy ended). Kaye's attitude was very poor and she basically alluded to that we were being punished for ending our tenancy early (which the landlord had happily agreed to) and not inline with their notice period. As the check out inspection is pivotal in the return of our deposit, I do not expect such a rude and unprofessional response to a reasonable request to attend the checkout (especially as ARLA state this in their code of conduct - something MBM Property proudly states on their website).
There are some nice staff there though - Gemma, Satvinder and Giorgio spring to mind (those who we dealt with in the past), who were courteous, professional and helpful, but unfortunately the poor attitude and service leaves a bad taste.
I appreciate that MBM are employed as agents and maybe us knowing the landlord meant they were uncomfortable being kept out of the loop on some things, but that's life - get over it. Don't penalise people for taking a vested interest in the way that tenancy works, especially if you shout about it on your own website.
At the end of the day, whilst the experience with MBM was nice to start with, it quickly went downhill (with the exception of a few nice people in the mix every now and then) during our tenancy, and we are looking forward to receiving our deposit back and having nothing to do with them in the future.”
