butters john bee - Estate and Letting Agents Hanley Reviews 

Was met by Rhian on a Saturday morning at the property as he was doing some viewings for me, very professional and courteous and the people viewing the property seemed to get on well with him

Buying my council house, valued last year at 145,00. Was ill and did not complete sale in time, so had to have a fresh valuation. Now valued at 165,00. Did properties increase by 15 percent in 12 months?????Gross incompetence. I think this estate agent makes up its own rules.

My experience with the Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent branch. If you are a landlord, please, please, please don't rent your house through this company. You will pay them for doing absolutely nothing! If I had to tell you all the problems I've had with this company and their incompetence I would need to write an essay. Good luck if you take this lightly. You have been told!!!!

There is something really wrong with a company that makes commission on sales yet refuses to communicate with prospective buyers when offers are submitted. I offered on a particular property and chased and chased for two weeks. I was finally told the property went to best and final bids but I was never contacted. I put that down to a simple communication issue and moved on. Second property i put an offer in which was before xmas and I am still awaiting feedback on the offer. I chased a couple of times and told “someone will call me back. Maybe they are waiting for a sign from god :-)
Anyone thinking of listing with this company be careful, if I see a property that I like which I just did, if its with BJB i dont even bother enquiring now

Just thought I’d mention what fantastic service I received from Celine Hollinshead when she came to value our house .

She answered all of our questions & took the time to explain anything I didn’t quite understand there wasn’t a rush at all .

I’m very happy with the service I received from Celine

Awful company. Overpaid my last months rent in my property. Alerted them straight away and was told they would look out for it and send it back as soon as it came in at the end of the day. 5 days later still wasn't back so I chased again. The woman on the phone says they actually didn't have my bank details and to email them. The email address she provided didn't even work! It is now 20 days since and I have chased multiple times only to be told it will be sent and accounts have been told the urgency, still everyday it is missed from their payroll. I just want my money back now! It would appear they like to withhold people's money from them. It is very worrying that an accounts department struggle to make even a bacs payment! Certainly not equipped to deal with large fees and houses in my opinion so would run for the hills if anyone was thinking of going with them! I feel for Claire who has kept chasing for me and getting nowhere, as she is the only one in the company who has bothered to even get back to me or chase. They have left me at the point now where I am assuming they are refusing to send me my money and will now have to take further action to retrieve it. Complaint will also be made to the ombudsman.

I am currently in the process of buying my first home and Lily at the Hanley branch has been extremely helpful. Any questions I have had have been answered quickly and nothing is too much to ask!

I am a landlord with a fully managed property. I have repeatedly advised BJB of a change of e mail address and bank details which were not acted upon, and more recently was charged an extortionate amount for two Income and Expenditure reports, neither of which I received, when all I requested was a monthly statement of my account. I have repeatedly asked for a refund, which was promised in mid September, but after much chasing I have only just received half of the amount taken. My e mails have not been acknowledged and promised return of phone calls do not materialise.
Overall, a very inefficient and unprofessional company which should be avoided if at all possible.

I won't recommend this company at all.
Hopeless service.
I had a new boiler installed with free 10 years service and I gave all the documents to BJB when I gave the house to rent. After 4 years when i took back the house not single service was done and lost my free service.
When I gave the second house to rent no proper maintenance have done. I told BJB to sign the tenancy agreement for 1 year, but BJB told tenant required for 6 months tenancy agreement. When I met the tenant he said BJB only required them to go for 6 months agreement.
After 2 years I had enough with BJB and the end of agreement I told them to terminate the contract. But BJB said when I terminate the contract I need to vacate the tenant. If I want the tenant to continue I need to pay £820 according to terms and conditions.
By misleading the landlord and tenant I have almost lost £1500 which is not acceptable.
Even they have paid £50 compensation for poor customer service.
Many more complaints to explain but no use
DON'T TRUST THIS COMPANY.

This is a terrible company to use. They never return calls or emails. Would never use them again and would tell anyone who is considering using them to be aware.
Sold my house through them and had nothing but headache. When I went to collect keys to withdraw property from market, they took me seriously. Very expensive fees for a company that does not value its paying customers

Received a letter in the post trying to guilt trip us into selling our home so a family of adults can move in? We have a child living here, so I don't see how adults are a priority. Never dealt with BJB before and certainly won't after reading this! Besides, the family want a detached house and most houses around the target areas are semi-detached/terraces, so clearly BJB don't know the area too well.

Update: spoke with the brach over the phone to find out why it's acceptable to be posted this letter, and we were greeted by rude, condesending staff. Terrible service. Maybe BJB should consider the residents that are receiving their letters as they don't know their personal circumstances.

I've been a landlord with BJB since 2007, no issues. However, since 2021 and I think with a management change, it has all been going downhill.

Not keeping me compliant with my regulatory requirements, not taking ownership of issues and not recompensing me appropriately for mistakes they made.

I rate Emma but everyone else lost their duty of care. Sadly, I had no choice but to leave.

If I could give a 0 I would!
I would absolutely not go through this company again far too many wrong doings to list them all, however myself and my landlord both decided to leave Butters John Bee and go elsewhere (one reason being that Butters were holding the land lords money even though it was paid by ourselves) You just get messed about and passed from pillar to post when wanting answers or something done they really couldn’t care less! Molly Farrelly is a complete waste of time and so is everyone else to be completely honest!
I certainly would never recommend this company to anyone and I know a couple other people who have had extremely bad experiences with them also. AVOID! I’m now with Bellwood Lettings and they are 1000000x better!

The worst agent to deal with! They are fraudulent and deceptive. I paid holding deposit but was refused access to the property for more than 2 months. They kept on postponing move in dates. Only for them to put the same property back into the market and still write available now.

I had a very helpful experience because of the helpful and professional work from one of the Managers at BJB Hanley.

Dominika handle my situation where my electricity had been cut off and she put my mind at peace and dealt with the matter swiftly.

I also had another issue I needed help with due to a difficult Neighbor and that too was handled by Dominika with great care and sensitivity.

I'm very grateful for all her hard work as she helped me massively and put my mind at ease and took a massive burden off my shoulders.

Many Thanks Dominika.

I am extremely dissatisfied with the service I received from Butters estate agent. They failed to communicate with me about the progress of my property sale, ignored my phone calls and emails, and redirected me to a head office that never returned my messages. They also recommended a conveyancing solicitor that was shut down by the CLC (Council for Licensed Conveyancers) the day before I was supposed to move. Butters did not inform me of this situation and I had to take time away from work and waste my time and money to visit their Hanley branch in person because they wouldn't answer my calls. This has caused me a lot of stress and frustration and I do not recommend them to anyone.

Butters John Bee, HANLEY
Steven Parker
It was amazing after I decided to leave my propery on rent, Steve was very professional and found the tenenant with 2 days and completly finalized the whole process with in 3 to 4 days.
He was also helping me to sort the EICR report from the person who did it, personally through facebook, Thank you Steve keep up the good work

Thanks
Arun

Phoned about commercial property that they are advertising. They have No details, other than 3 pictures. And don't know any info either they can't get in touch with owners, so butters just don't call back. Great company procedure that.
5 th time I ve used this firm. And all 5 have been very disappointing.
No wonder people avoid a property, if it's got a butters John bee sign.

Disgracefully poor - Butters!
Updated 05.08.22, refund now through.

Hang your head in shame the Lettings team at Hanley, in particular Molly Farrelly - in my experience the Lettings department at Hanley are an unprofessional team with low morals and high prices.
As a landlord I would recommend you look elsewhere and you will find a decent agent that communicates well with you and your tenant, and it costs less.
I have two rental properties and have used Butters John Bee fully managed service from 2016 - all was good when Rebekka was still there holding up the fort. However, when she and most of her team left we have now been served up the most unpleasant customer service I have experienced - ranging from little to no communication and not being able to ring and speak with your contact (they are always on a visit or something more important), to being lied to and told they would call back and they don't. It's the same with emails, in the main they are ignored.
Some months ago I was incorrectly charged by Butters for services when my tenant forgot to cancel her standing order when we left Butters John Bee (we were at the end of our tether and could not continue with them). I have an email from Steve Parker to confirm will get a refund of £41.11 out of the £91.11 they took (they are keeping £50 admin charges), and this was for fees associated to the management costs when they were no longer managing our property. I have sent numerous messages and been told it needs director sign off for £41.11. Perhaps Spicer Haart or Butters will read this and make it easier for future landlords/tenants? I have not been allowed to be put through to anyone in finance. I find the team lacks discipline, structure and guidance and they just seem to be making false promises in the hope that people will forget and move on. I have been chasing £41.11 for months, it's no longer about the money but the principle - come on Butters, you can do better. Trust Pilot now has a number of reviews similar to mine. I will be emailing a copy of this to help@spicerhaart and also lettingscustomer.relations@spicerhaart, so please don't give me your standard response. In terms of resolution, i just want my money back that is being wrongfully kept by Butters John Bee. It is for £41.11, really, why haven't you sorted this?
Update 05.08.22
Melanie Murchie from Haart/Butters has been truly professional and stepped in where others failed - she has sorted everything out in a very friendly manner and the refund has been repaid. Thanks too to Trust Pilot for making our position known.

We rented a house from BJB Jan 2020 - Jun 2021. During the process of getting everything sorted to move in they were absolutely amazing. As soon as we moved in, that very quickly stopped. Most maintenance requests sat unresolved for the entire tenancy, including issues like the roof and the boiler leaking; some requests they sent someone to deal with after a few months, but the person always said they needed specialist equipment and would be back in touch - which of course never happened.

Worst of all is to this day we haven't heard anything about getting our deposit back, despite my housemate emailing and calling them about it several times over the past year. Every time it's "we'll chase that up for you" but all they ended up doing was block his number so now he can't even ring anymore.

BJB is really out here stealing people's money and having 0 remorse about it. Can't recommend never renting from them enough.