ASA bans estate agent's tweets

9 November 2011 | By Natalie Thomas

The press ad, in July 2011, featured pictures and details for properties available to rent. Text under the heading “Did you know?” stated “cmRENT have let 331 properties since January 4 2011 ranging from studio flats to six bed homes, prices from £350 pcm to £2000 pcm”.

Further text under the heading “Tenants” stated “We currently have over 35 properties available for rent.”

The Twitter feed contained the tweets “TOTAL TO RENT: cmRENT have 93 Rental properties available” sent on July 21 2011 and “TOTAL TO RENT: cmRENT have 105 Rental properties available” sent on July 28.

But Frost Residential Lettings challenged whether the claims were misleading and could be substantiated.

cmRENT explained to the ASA that in the press ad, the number of properties available to rent was based on the number of properties available on its website, excluding those under referencing or under offer.

It said there was a three-day delay between the figures being prepared and published in the paper, which was why they stated the date they were compiled in the ad. cmRENT said the ‘35’ figure could be substantiated by counting the number of properties in the ad that were not listed as being ’under referencing’.  

They explained that their website automatically generated the Twitter feed, and that the figure included properties for all areas covered by both of their offices and properties that were under referencing and under offer.

They said the figure would change on an hourly or daily basis as new properties were added, and that consumers would be able to click through from the tweet to their website to view those properties. cmRENT provided a copy of a list of rental properties taken from their back-up server at the end of each day.

But the ASA concluded that consumers would understand the claim in the press ad to refer to properties available to rent through the Chelmsford office only.

The ASA noted that the Twitter feeds were sent from a generic cmRENT address and linked to the cmRENT website for both offices, and it considered that it would therefore be clear to consumers that the available rental figures referred to the total number of rental properties available across the cmRENT office network.

However, it also noted that the claimed number of rental properties included properties that were under referencing or under offer, and were therefore not available to be viewed by consumers.

If you enjoyed this article, sign up here to receive daily email updates from Mortgage Strategy and Follow @mortgagestrat