ARLA Propertymark Reviews 105

Fair and informative meeting, friendly and did not feel threatening as anticipated by the word "Audit". The advice received was well worth the time taken to attend, indeed, so informative, I could claim 1 hour CPD points for attending!

I had an Audit review with Darren on the 20th July 2023. This was done in an extremely professional manner sharing a lot of useful information that I will be incorporating into our business.

Had an audit by Darren Kitchenside - a very pleasurable experience. Darren shared a great deal of information and helped us tighten up our procedures to ensure we remain compliant. A great service - thank you.

A positive experience with some good extra pints raised to make sure you have everything covered.

If you are summoned for an audit - don't panic!!
Darren was really helpful and made it clear that it was to help protect and prevent our business from any future liability in most situations. He was indeed very helpful and informative - Thank you Darren

I was initially frustrated to have to make the time for an audit, having very recently provided all the necessary compliance papers. I am however delighted to have taken the time to look through my procedures with Darren. His tips and recommendations were invaluable and I'm very grateful for the time he took with me.

Had a very good meeting and review with Darren. Came away with many useful suggestions and good advice. His depth of knowledge is wide ranging and also his appreciation of all that we do right was good to hear. His suggestions on how we can improve were warmly received

When I first received the email letting me know we were going to have an audit I have to admit I went somewhat into panic mode. Having never had an audit before I really did not know what to expect, so imagined the worst, What will they find? What haven't I done, what will happen if we don't pass? Even more worried when I got the next email with all the things i needed to prepare for the meeting...at that point realising that there were definitely things I should have been doing, and yet had not. So I bit the bullet and decided to give Darren a call, and so, so glad I did. He totally put my mind at rest and gave me the reassurance i needed. This is NOT a test. The whole point is to help highlight any areas where we could do better and it wasn't a pass/fail test. Darren was very friendly and incredibly helpful. I need not have worried. The whole experience actually was helpful and practical, and if anything I came away knowing that for the most part we have got things right. I would advise anyone who is feeling anxious or worried to just give Darren a call before hand.. it really did make the difference for me.

When I got the email saying that ARLA/PM are coming to do an inspection, my heart missed a beat and I immediately scanned through my recent crimes and misdemeanours - "OMG! What have we done wrong?" a bit like when I drive past a police car (but that may just be me..) I needn't have worried, Darren was excellent in every way. From the pre-appointment call through to the end of our three hour meeting with him, he was calm, rational, informative and above all helpful. Thank you Darren. I would heartily recommend any agent call him in for a check up. Invaluable.

Being a small independent and not having a large staff pool means we are all busy. This means that some things may get overlooked. A property mark compliance visit via a team video call or a physical visit was something i was not looking forward to. Darren actually called a day or two in advance to put me and my wife who deals with the finance at ease, which was much appreciated. The visit was pleasant and very informative and helpful. Don't Panic its not a terrible experience.

The thought of being audited can evoke trepidation for any business, especially a small one, even if one believes that they make every effort to ensure that all their affairs are in order. I guess that’s just human nature. Prior to his planned visit, Darren took the trouble to call me In advance and without exaggeration, within seconds a sense of reassurance was palpable. To add context, bizarrely and ironically, a feeling of apprehension rapidity mutated to anticipation. On the day itself, I certainly wasn’t disappointed. Aside from being informative and educational, I unexpectedly benefited from pointers on how to streamline certain processes and that some were even redundant (despite efforts cautiously to go above and beyond). In an unrelenting environment of ever increasing bureaucracy where small firms such us ourselves can spend every waking hour worrying about being continually compliant instead of focusing a living, what’s not to like about that?! Darren is professional, personable and demonstrates a human element which seems to be sadly disappearing from society. Was the experience what I was hoping for? No! It was better! I would also add that a previous visit from Ian Potter several years ago was a similarly pleasant experience. In conclusion, for anyone anxious about this process, in my opinion, it is to be encouraged…..and may leave you wanting more!
D.S. Properties (UK) Ltd

Darren Kitchenside visited Parkheath. His inputs were really useful and constructive.

Darren Kitchenside was a true gentleman whilst carrying out our audit
He provided our remote review via Zoom and was extremely helpful & professional with great insights & tips to maintain professional standards across all areas of our business
With good suggestions to ensure compliance and many helpful ideas to ensure that we are on the ball in all aspects of our Agency from Lettings through to Sales & AML, we are very grateful to him & ARLA for keeping our Company one step ahead of its competitors

Naturally apprehensive about our Compliance Audit however Darren was very personable and led the audit in a friendly and informative manner, offered suggestion and advice where needed and quickly followed up with an easy to follow bullet pointed email checklist for me to follow up on. Turned out to be quite an enjoyable experience and has made me feel confident that we are fully compliant. Thanks Darren - looking forward to the next audit (and thats a sentence I never thought I would hear myself say!!)

I recently had an audit with Darren Kitchenside. He was very friendly and made what can be a difficult experience very easy and enjoyable. I had pre sent all documents needed which he had already looked through before the audit which saved time. After the audit he emailed me quickly with a few points to check and also with some advice which I found helpful. Many thanks Darren.

Our experience with the compliance team (mainly Tim) was amazing, we got regular email updates and phone calls, the outcome was extremely positive, we felt very confident that we had them behind us whilst dealing with a complicated issue.

This week we had an audit with Darren Kitchenside. The term "audit" throws up all kinds of negative connotations but I found this audit to not only be thorough but also informative. Darren was great at asking the kind of questions which make you think about your processes from a practical point of view. It's easy to look compliant but actually diving into examples of where compliance has been important opened up conversations about situations that we have dealt with in the past and how we dealt with them. Darren followed up very quickly with notes from the audit and he also provided handy documentation to help add to our existing business forms and public facing information. This audit is something that we would consider doing once a year.

We recently had the absolute pleasure of Darren Kitchenside attend our office to conduct a compliance site visit and it turned out to be a truly invaluable, useful and thoroughly enjoyable exercise (which sounds like a total oxymoron, but this is the absolute truth!).

Not only was Darren extremely knowledgeable, thorough and helpful in pointing out areas of (oblivious) oversights and aspects requiring changes/updating, the approach was very friendly and the overall demeanour exceptional! And if there was anything Darren was unsure of, he was super expedient in getting you the answers the very next day (the pre-report was issued the very same evening at c. 8:30pm).

Do not feel daunted in any way by these “audit visits” (esp. if you’re lucky enough to get Darren) as Darren was very reassuring in making the meeting all about ensuring you are up to date with compliance in a constructive manner, in order to protect you and the business.

Compared to previous audit visits , this particular one stood out as the best as it made a real difference in terms of highlighting certain factors that we were oblivious to (some that had been long standing so should have been picked up previously) but with Darren’s expertise and knowledge, we were able to correct any and all shortcomings/omissions.

Thank you Darren for a constructive day and wonderful experience - myself the team really enjoyed your company!

Keep up the good work as you are a true asset to Propertymark!

just had a virtual Audit, with Darren. got to say it was as enjoyable as an audit could be. questions were straight forward and the advice given was both helpful and informative.
thanks Darren hopefully we we wont speak again too soon ;)

Darren Kitchenside, the Compliance Auditor, arrived on Monday morning as scheduled and proceeded to go through all the issues and questions to ensure that we are compliant. We have done an annual audit, originally our accountant reported and then more recently the Health Checks, for many years, but this felt the most useful. Darren was thorough, appreciative of all the efforts we make to remain fully compliant and extremely helpful with advice. The whole process took a couple of hours but gave Darren a thorough knowledge of our compliance and gave us pointers to a couple of areas where we can do even better.