It may be Christmas but the Festive Spirit may not have reached Cumbria just yet as an Estate Agent in the flood hit area decided what the 7000 newly homeless people needed was their fees trebled as they began a search for rented accommodation while their own houses dried out.
Cumbrian Properties opened on Sunday to an expected deluge of calls for accommodation only to be told that the 'admin charge' for new tenants had gone up from £200 to £600.
After the media got wind of it the big hearted agency miraculously discovered it had made an error of judgement and put the fees back to £200 with a lame excuse that it had staff who worked 12-hour shifts on Sunday and the increase was to cover the cost of staffing to get people in properties.
'I realised on Monday I should not have done that and we apologise for the bad feeling this has caused' explained a sheepish Adrian Hogarth before agreeing to refund the new tenants who were charged the fee.
I am sure that people will remember the name 'Cumbrian Properties' and 'Adrian Hogarth' in the future for all their accommodation needs and will act accordingly by flicking them the finger and going elsewhere.
If, as expected, the bad publicity does have a detrimental effect on you Mr Hogarth and your business now sinks beneath the English Channel currently lapping around the county then I am sure there will be no shortage of offers from the locals to put you up, for an extortionate £600 administration fee of course.
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