Mary Portas creates a precedent for estate agents

 It was Mary Portas to the rescue again last night on Secret Shopper (CH4) as she fought to create a new bred of estate agents that are trustworthy, hardworking and honest, a mean task considering 79 per cent of people don’t trust them. As a soon to be first time buyer this rings alarm bells, especially when retail expert Mary Portas discovered that most estate agents receive little or no training before they are sent to do a viewing.

North London estate agents Martyn Gerard provide new recruits with an hours training on customer service, found Mary as she went to give the family business of eight offices a helping hand. However founder Martyn, and now owner Simon Gerard, claimed they only wanted Mary’s help rather than needed it as their service is far superior to the competition because they go the extra mile with personal touches. These consist of a letter to say thank you with an umbrella on to paying customers. Mary tells them ‘Your (estate agents) reputation is as good as poo on the street.’ So she meets up with Martyn Gerard’s top seller Philip Johnson and reveals secret footage of him doing a viewing with a customer, if you can call it that what with his phone glued to his ear. At another viewing he tells a customer that ‘West facing is the new South facing’, its all 'smoke and mirrors' argues Mary, who decides to set the team a task to be a tour guide for the day at Kenwood House. The team excel, which angers her further.

Ms Portas suggests a new approach to viewings, estate agents must list positives and negatives of a property and get rid of all the jargon, with a banned list of clichés, ‘on a popular/prestigious turning’, ‘good for DIY enthusiasts’. Simon Gerard isn’t too keen on Mary’s ideas.

To road test this honest service, Philip and colleague Veronica agree to show customers around two homes that have been on their books for a long time, only they must do a viewing in a different way by using knowledge told to them by the seller and no spin.The result- customers say it’s the best viewing they’ve ever had.

Weeks into the new approach and 100 per cent of customers agree they are pleased with Martyn Gerard’s service and fully trust them, which of course wins Simon around.

4-0 to Mary!!