Death Knell for the TDS?

During a telephone conference last week, with one of our business partners, I was asked whether I’d been keeping up to speed with the latest tenancy deposit scheme news. I had to confess that while I was aware of the general furore I wasn’t fully ‘clued up’ on the subject. Things at LetsXL being as busy as ever; there are still only so many hours in a day after all.

I had a quick catch up on a few websites and could see that the subject was slowly becoming quite heated. It was only when I visited an agent yesterday though that I realised how palpable the frustration towards the TDS is. The agent I was visiting told me they had seen an increase of over 200% for their annual premium; despite being able to count the number of disputes on one hand.  I was then told of another agent in the same area, who’d had more than a handful of disputes, and received a renewal premium in excess of £20,000.

Premiums are apparently increasing while dispute adjudicators are made redundant leaving agents concerned about the lead times of future disputes. All of this is against the backdrop of statically low interest rates. The agent was telling me they’d seen the interest they receive fall from thousands per annum to hundreds, despite holding significantly more deposits. It would appear the TDS scheme no longer looks financially viable for many agents, never mind appealing.

On the other side of the coin contacts close to the DPS tell me they are seeing a significant increase in the number of deposits they are holding. It would appear there is a significant sway towards the custodial scheme from the letting agency market. Less hassles, no cost and a track record (as young as it may be) of handling disputes within service level agreements appears to be driving business their way.

I guess that TDS couldn’t have asked for a worse economic environment to work in. An increase in disputes was inevitable in such trying times and low interest rates preclude the possibility of agents creating income to offset against premium costs. When you look at the options form a logical point of view I find it hard to see how the TDS will survive.

George

Remember When We Were not an I.T. Company but a Service Provider to the Lettings Industry? (George McDonald)

As 2010 rushes towards us I've been reflecting on the changes I've seen at LetsXL since my first day in May 2004. I started back then as the operations manager and on my first day the total staff comprised of me and one other employee. I can actually remember on my second day being sat behind a desk with very little to do, managing my 'team' who had very little to do thinking "what on earth have I done". Now I sometimes have to pinch myself when I see the small army we have working for us (and I yearn for 5 minutes at my desk with very little to do). We also, three years ago, moved from our first offices (basically a converted flat) to the 3,000 sq ft. of modern office space we occupy now. I'm pretty sure Wesley is already thinking about our next larger offices.


These changes though are nowhere near the biggest I have seen in our business. The progression and requirements for I.T. systems within our industry and UK business as a whole fits this bill. We really are in the technology age and the technological demands from consumers intensifies year on year. 


It's interesting to see how computers have taken over the most menial of tasks while at the same time social networking is beginning to exert its influence over how we interact from a business perspective. Businesses have to avoid being at the wrong end of a 'twitterstorm' at all costs, as seen with the recent Jan Moir (Daily Mail) / Stephen Gateley story. News of a bad product offering can also quickly spread through the use of social networking. As was seen with the original release of the Blackberry Storm, which received a 'not too glowing' informal review from a celebrity who had a massive twitter following.


From a sales and marketing perspective we are starting to see some very clever use of social networking. None more so than the recent Ikea campaign. They used Facebook's picture tagging facility to quickly spread the word about a new store opening as well as advertising the brand as a whole. I would urge you to take 2 minutes out of your day to go and view THIS VIDEO which shows the immense power at our fingertips.


Social networking, I believe, remains in its infancy with its true impact yet to be seen. The next step along the way may well be Google's wave application which I have had the pleasure of using. The possibilities, from a business perspective, are incredible for this simple yet powerful tool. This is especially true in the B2B environment. Imagine being able to host a focus group with your top customers or a brainstorming session with your colleagues very simply, no matter where in the world they are. I wait with baited breath for the full version release.


Major retailers are no longer major retailers unless they have a fully interactive and simple to use website. Businesses, or more truthfully brand names, are also getting a second lease of life; as we have seen with the recent acquisition of the Woolworths' brand name and website only offering. In the B2B environment the demands are increasing at a rapid rate, with a more pronounced requirement for innovation as well as simplicity. 


For our own business we've had to react to the increased I.T. demands over the past 12 months and acknowledge that to truly gain competitive advantage we must be at the forefront of technological development. I make it sound easy don't I? It is anything but. As well as the design and development  of new web technologies we have to continually consider the suitability of our entire infrastructure and ensure it remains fast, efficient and most importantly secure and safe. Every simple change you see on any website (especially those you visit regularly) has several knock on effects into different I.T. areas.


We initially outsourced all of our I.T. work. Oh, wonderful hindsight! Despite every promise at the beginning of every I.T. project, even when they were in writing, we still found ourselves over budget, behind deadlines and failing to deliver. I strongly recommend that any SME weighs up the possibility of employing their own development team while considering their I.T. options.


In the past we were a tenant referencing and insurances provider, with a sidelined, sub-contracted I.T. provision. These days we have recognised that the centre of our business is, in essence, an I.T. company. An I.T. company that we must have control over. So for the first time this year we employed our own I.T. team and the difference to date is remarkable. We have some pretty amazing changes coming early in the new year - on time, in budget and innovative.


I.T. in our industry will be one of the key 'battlegrounds' where customers will be won or lost over the coming years. Even this blog in an interim solution until our new website is launched early next year, we strive to keep improving. But our 'army' is not quite as well equipped as our bigger competitors, which means that we have to work smarter. Much like Google did in the early days; but it is a challenge we are more than happy to take on. 


Just as a pure coincidence Steve has just introduced me to the newest of our I.T. developers, another forward thinker for the team!


Posted by George
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Welcome to our Blog

Welcome to our blog and our first blog post. We plan to follow a different route with our blog and here are the rules:

1. We won't use this blog to sell you our products and services
2. We will provide you with up to date information about the operations of our business
3. We won't be posting details of new products on this blog
4. We will be posting opinions on the current goings on within our operations
5. We will be posting our opinions on what is happening within the marketplace

So a blog without the hard sell. Refreshing isn't it?

You'll see blog posts from four main contributors and I've included their 'usual fields of expertise' in brackets:

Wesley Weir - Managing Director (marketplace comment and finance)

George McDonald - Operations Director (marketplace comment, operations comment and I.T.)

Stephen Poppleton - Operations Development Manager (I.T. and operations comment)

Clare Jones - Operations Manager (operations comment and HR)

We hope you enjoy our blog and find it a useful resource.

George