Not as easy as you may think if the experience of Jacquline Henderson is anything to go by?
Normally Firstport issue service charge demands early in March as they are due for payment on 1st April.
It is vital that the demands are sent out early as penalties are incurred if service charges are paid late.
Firstport will send a reminder to the leaseholder after the due date for payment.
If no payment is forthcoming another letter is sent with a £60 administration fee added.
Leave it one week later to pay and the leaseholder's file will be passed to a debt collection agency with a host of added fees.
Wishing to avoid this possibilty and not having received her ground rent demand Miss Henderson contacted Firstport to ask about her ground rent demand.
What followed was a succession of phone calls taking up over an hour of Miss Henderson's valuable time and a succession of incredible and purile excuses as to the non appearance of the service charge demand.
Miss Henderson (as does About Peverel) do not in anyway seek to blame the operatives involved. they can only work with the information and training given by management.
Over the course of several phone calls, Miss Henderson was given various responses as to why the service charge demand had not been issued?
Answers ranged from "I don't know why, you should have received it" " I can't see anything on the system" "We are very busy as we have a lot of developments to manage, so we can't do all the developments on time" " We have a large backlog" "The Financial Analysts have not been able to process the service charge demand "
"You will still have 30 days to pay" (This directly contradicts the Firstport payment policy)
Indeed Firstport also say " It is important that you pay your account on time. Late payments have a huge impact on levels of service and maintenance we can provide and ultimately affects your development"
After asking to speak to a manager Miss Henderson is put on "hold" and when the operative returns he informs Miss Henderson that "no one at Firstport can speak to her and that she must only make contact by email or letter"
Oddly an invoice for payment which Miss Henderson acknowledges has been sent with a wrong company number which renders the demand invalid.
Miss Henderson's property is managed by Firstport Property Services Ltd (company number2061041)
And yet the company number ascribed to Firstport Property Services is given as 1623496.
A check with Companies House reveals that 1623496 belongs to Firstport Bespoke Property Services(which whilst being a part of the Knight Square Group) is a completely separate and distinct company.
Miss Henderson's property has no connection with Firstport Bespoke Property Services.
A Firstport representative issued the following statement:
Following the consolidation of mant legacy brands/companies a few years ago, Firstport property serrvices and Firstport Bespoke Property Services are shared trading names for two technically distinct legal entities within our own group.
I am advised that some further refinement of legal entities may be carried out soon to hopefully further clarify and simplify "Who does what?" for both my fellow staff and our customers.
Firstport Property Services can be contacted on 0333 321 4080.
Miss Henderson's account number is 80175010001.
Flat 1, Phoenix House Leicester, LE15 5JE
As she has been told that she cannot speak to Firstport directly perhaps readers may wish to speak on her behalf and ask Firstport to send her the service charge demand?
