Terms in letting agreements relating to the payment of renewal commission and commision payable if a property was sold to the tenant were found, on the basis of the particular wording used, to be unfair under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999.
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) brought an action challenging the terms and conditions contained in the letting contracts used by an estate agency, Foxtons. The OFT said that the terms were unfair, and sought a declaration to this effect or an injunction in respect of two contracts. Shortly before the hearing, Foxtons stopped using the terms in question (the ‘old terms’) and started to use different terms (the ‘new terms’). Although some of the terms queried by the OFT have been removed, the question of the fairness of the old terms remained. Questions also arose as to the fairness of the new terms.
The clauses in respect of which the OFT took action were:
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