Rogue Traders

During the hurricane winds the other week the satellite dish on my building stopped working and - horror of horrors - no football or any of the many other delights normally shown on Sky TV.

So the new Property Manager sent along a contractor to investigate and repair the problem - PDQ.

But it turned out that the dish on the building was obsolete - one that stopped being made more than 9 years ago - incredibly several years older than the building itself.

So it seems the owners were duped by the Building Developer who also appointed himself as the first Property Manager - a chap called Michael Pater and his company Briskchange Limited.

Now the reason I am sharing this with readers is that the owners in the building had to get organised - and run this character off the premises - because Michael Pater and Briskchange Limited were ripping us all off - big time.

By charging people for services that were never delivered - and by overcharging for some of the few services that were delivered - often to a very poor standard.

Michael Pater and his company - even left the building without insurance for a period of months - without telling anyone.

Which cost us all a whole whack of extra money - just to have emergency insurance put in place - otherwise the building and everything in the building - was exposed to huge risk.

So the owners got together - which isn't easy let me tell you - because communal property Title Deeds require all decisions to be made by a clear majority - and that takes some doing when there are lots of owners involved.

I would say the task is akin to 'herding cats' - but it was worth it in the end - because this 'rogue trader' was effectively run out of town.

Not surprisingly Michael Pater doesn't show his face around these parts any more - not least because there's a queue of creditors trying their best to track him down.

But I'm told that Michael Pater and Briskchange Limited might still be trading in the west of Scotland - possibly under a different name.

So if you come across Briskchange Limited, then my advice - based on my personal experience - is to turn right around and run away - as fast as possible in the opposite direction.

I only hope that the Scottish Parliament introduces new legislation on regulating Property Managers and Factors in Scotland - which Holyrood MSPs discussed in 2011.

Because in my experience - some of the them are worse than useless - in fact they can be complete 'duds'.