We’re delighted to invite you to our upcoming industry seminar. Resident will be joined by Bolt Burdon Solicitors and LBB Chartered Surveyors, who will offer both a legal and surveying perspective on roof top development on blocks of flats. For more information and to secure your free place sign up here.
Author: ResiDev
Invitation to free Resident Seminar: Roof top development – You, the law and the pitfalls
Resident Release Notes 12th February 2018
As part of our commitment to continuous improvement, this weekend we gave Resident a slight face lift. The navigation remains the same, but we have changed the look of the left-hand menu. You still have all the same sections and subsections, but now they expand in a pull-out menu to the right, rather than cascading below. This change means the whole menu remains visible (plus it enables us to add an Estate level to the Resident platform in the future).
We have also included the first update to our Calendar section. Now, after accessing My Work/Calendar, you can filter tasks that are assigned to you or that you have delegated.
Plus, you can now access a task directly from the calendar, and once you have finished editing it, you can go back to the calendar.
Resident Release Notes 2nd February 2018
Resident now has the ability to attach a cover letter to Service Charge Demands, Ground Rent Invoices or General Invoices. A new article that explains how you can set up and use the cover letter option has been added to Resident Knowledge Hub. You can view it here. A cover letter allows you to add another letter/document to invoices which are being sent by email to leaseholders. You can also print it if required, together with a statement and invoices. In the first part of this article, we show you an example of how to add a cover letter to a Service Charge demand. In the second part, we demonstrate how to utilise the customisable paragraph option. You can follow the same steps for Ground Rent or General Invoices. You can have multiple letter templates in the system, which you can enable or disable whenever you need.
Resident contributes to RICS report on ethical implications of technology in the built environment
As the RICS say in the introduction to their latest white paper,’recent years have seen advances in technology that are impacting the built environment and the role of professionals everywhere. The increasing reliance on data and technology to work, communicate and make key business decisions has sparked intense ethical debates’.
As part of the RICS Tech Affiliate Program, leading industry thinkers met to consider the ethical implications of technology in the built environment. Read the full RICS report here
Consultation on the fourth edition of the RICS Service Charge Code (2007) – Commercial Property
With a consultation on the fourth edition of the RICS Service Charge Code (2007) underway, Darren Coleran, a partner at Bolt Burdon, reviews the proposed changes.
“A service charge is a means by which a landlord can recover from tenants the cost of maintaining and repairing the building and providing certain services.
Given that the money comprising the service charge is usually formed of the contributions made by the tenants, there are often frictions in respect of how this money is spent.
In residential property there are more stringent and clear regulations in respect of service charge which historically, and to date, commercial property has not benefited from or been subject to.
The service charge regimes for commercial property are usually set out within the commercial lease relating to the particular property. Up until now there have been various external contributions and publications which have contributed the drafting of these regimes and how they operate in practice. One such publication being the RICS Service Charge Code (2007). This effectively sets out best practice and recommendations as to how the service charge regimes could be operated fairly and transparently.
This code is now currently in its third edition with a consultation on the fourth, underway. The new edition of the code proposes going quite a bit further than simply setting out best practice, but rather imposes mandatory principles that surveyors will be bound to follow, including how such principles should be applied. It is proposed that the changes will take effect from 1 April 2018.
The 8 mandatory principles (as well as other changes), are:
- Owners and managers must not seek to recover more than 100% of the proper and actual costs of the provision or supply of services, unless expressly provided for in the lease
- Owner and managers must ensure that service charge budgets, including appropriate explanatory commentary, are issued annually to all tenants,
– Owners and managers must ensure that a signed statement showing a true and accurate record of the actual expenditure constituting the service charge is provided annually to all tenants.
– Owners and managers must ensure that a service charge apportionment schedule for their property is provided annually to all tenants.
– All expenditure that the owner and manager seek to recover must be in accordance with the terms of the lease.
– Service charge monies (including reserve and sinking funds) must be held in one or more discrete (or virtual) bank accounts.
– All interest earned on service charge accounts – or where separate accounts per property are not operated, a proper and reasonable amount of interest calculated on normal commercial rates – must be credited to the service charge account after appropriate deductions have been made. This applies, for instance, to bank charges, tax, etc.
– Where acting on behalf of a tenant, RICS members must advise their clients that if a dispute exists any service charge payment withheld by the tenant should reflect only the actual sums in dispute.
The proposed code also encourages practitioners to pay regard to 11 principles which support the mandatory requirements. The principles include communicating and consulting with occupiers in relation to the standard and quality of service charge and ensuring value for money in accordance with the appropriate locations use and character of the property.
Training Options with RESIDENT
On-line telephone training
For added convenience, you can book training in hour long slots at a time and for a duration that suits you. Sessions are priced at £50 + VAT per hour.
On-site training
Book before 22 December and receive a half day training session for £475 + VAT and travel expenses, or a full day session for £825 + VATand travel expenses
Training in Tunbridge Wells
Why not treat yourself to a face-to-face training session here at Resident HQ in Tunbridge Wells. Starting at just £95 + VAT(with lunch included), this is a cost effective option for you to train in a focused environment, away from any office distractions.
And may we also introduce…
We’ve got a brand new Support Guru to work with our Resident Wizard, Michal. We’re delighted to introduce you to Katharine Edwards, Kat for short! Kat has an excellent background in customer service having operated at every organisational level, from customer facing support and on-site training, to managing a support team. A true problem solver, Kat loves a challenge and finding clever solutions for clients. It’s why her personal motto is ‘always strive to do things right, on time, every time’. For more information about Resident or our training support options please do get in touch. We’d love to hear from you.
Training at Resident HQ
These include cost effective, bespoke training sessions held here at Resident HQ in Tunbridge Wells, so you can train in a focused environment, away from any office distractions.
1 Person £95 + VAT At Tunbridge Wells office including lunch and refreshments
2 People £150 + VAT At Tunbridge Wells office including lunch and refreshments
3 People £195 + VAT At Tunbridge Wells office including lunch and refreshments
4 People £240 + VAT At Tunbridge Wells office including lunch and refreshments
On site training can also be booked, starting at £500 + VAT and travel costs for a half day, or £850 + VAT and travel costs for a full day.
Please contact Kate on 020 3751 5628 or email kate@resident.uk.com
Resident Block Management Software supports GDPR requirements
Given the looming May 2018 deadline and very weighty penalties if you fall foul of the legislation, it’s really no surprise that these new data protection rules are featuring in news articles and blogs on a daily basis. Just yesterday Property Industry Eye reported that GDPR is the reason why ZPG’s Property Software Group (PSG) is shutting down older desktop software and has written to their customers to advise they have 6 months’ notice before support of these systems is removed. While it may well be a sensible commercial decision for PSG to remove legacy software, this will no doubt be a cause of consternation for some of their customers who now have to decide which new estate agency software to purchase.
Resident Block Management software began our GDPR journey two years ago. We recognised it as an opportunity to present ourselves at the forefront of compliance and a platform to demonstrate our accountability as a software provider to our customers and target audience. It remains our ambition to help our clients apply best practice to the management of their block and provide them with the tools to stay compliant in the process.
In GDPR speak, Estate Agents are data controllers, and have ultimate responsibility for the protection of personal data. When choosing software for their business which handles Personally Identifiable Information (PII), they should consider whether that software follows, amongst others, the GDPR’s principles of Security by Design (SbD) and Privacy by Design (PbD).
The Resident block management software licence agreement, in conjunction with Microsoft Azure, supports the GDPR requirements, including the above principles, and therefore provides the foundations for estate agents to fulfil the requirements of the GDPR.
It is worth noting that software cannot (or should not) claim to provide a GDPR compliant service. This could be misleading and some agents may believe that installing certain software will be the GDPR solution which makes their business compliant. The GDPR has many more regulations that an organisation needs to comply with.
Whilst the May 2018 deadline is fast approaching, here at Resident we know compliance, along with innovation, is a continuous process. Where our early adoption of compliant licence agreements has given us much momentum, we continue to evolve and improve our systems. This is one of the reasons we are proud to be a member of the RICS Tech Affiliate Programme (TAP). TAP is working to improve the awareness and confidence in data and technology solutions so that standards can be adopted more easily across the sector. As part of this Resident is contributing to the RICS discussion around data handling and how this is affecting businesses, this will then feed into a professional statement the RICS are developing on data handling and cybercrime.
Kate Boyes
Founder, Resident Block Management Software
Expanding into Block Management or just time to invest in Software?
If you are considering expanding your sales and lettings offerings into Block Management we have start up block management software licences from £600 + VAT PA plus a Resource Centre stuffed full of all the paperwork you will need to get you going.
If you are an established firm looking to invest in software we look after c.250 clients with portfolios of upto and over 5,000 units and are confident our features will save your team both time and cost.
We are on the Cloud so work from anywhere, with no restriction on the number of users, and focus on email rather than print to save costs.
And as it is Black Friday we have some cracking deals on the licence fees, onsite training and the design of marketing brochures for your brand.
KB – Founder
Contact us for more info:
jon@resident.uk.com
0203 7515 628
Resident® Monday’s tips and tricks 13/11/2017
1. Creating an Invoice Group
Check out our ‘step by step’ article on how to create an invoice group for supplementary service charge demands, insurance or extra invoices for major work.
If you would like to know how it all works please follow the link below
2. Transferring a balance to the new owner
In response to one of your questions this week we have added a short article about how to transfer a balance between two ownerships. Clink the link below to find out more.
RESIDENT Release Notes 3rd November 2017
Update 1 – Introducing a brand new Works Orders page Now when you click on the Works Orders tile on your global dashboard you will land on a new page which includes all the Works Orders for all your properties. Here you are able to sort, create lists and directly access individual Work Orders at a Block level.
Update 2 – Further improvements to help you manage your data You can now delete notes added in any section of Resident via the Notes tab. Simply click on the bin icon on the right-hand side of the note. And don’t worry if you make a mistake. You can restore a note through Spanner/Agency/Undelete Items.
Update 3 – Better control over your expenditures against budget The Supplier Invoice and Works Order sections now have information buttons on each item in the details tab which allow you to quickly access information about Outstanding Budgeted Amounts and Money on Account. If you want to preview more details just click and hold on one of the two buttons.
The old adage, ‘it’s a small world’ really rang true this week.
Turn the clock back 15 years, social media was in its infancy, few of us had smartphones, no one had Google Maps or You Tube and I was in my second year at university.
I had just entered an essay competition that Property Week magazine were running and the subject was what would influence the property industry most in the next ten years. The term proptech hadn’t been invented back then, but even so I wrote how technology would influence and shape how properties would be built, maintained and importantly used by residents and workers.
I won the competition, saw my name in print when Property Week published my essay and received £1000 prize money plus an internship at Nelson Bakewell, sponsors of the competition. NB went on to offer me a graduate position after the internship.
Now, fifteen years later I find myself unexpectedly running my own property technology business and have this week welcomed Vicks Gifford to the team as our new marketing director. Vicks kicked off her marketing career at Nelson Bakewell and was responsible for promoting the essay competition. Since then she’s been head of marketing at Edward Symmons and, more recently was the marketing director for Lambert Smith Hampton. Like I said, it’s a small world, particularly within the property industry.
And if I was to write the essay again today, sustainability would be the central theme with the view that energy efficiency will be impacting property values within the next twenty years. In today’s world where technology means virtually anything is possible, there’s really very little excuse not be green.
KB – Founder
