Property managers seek subsidy

A property management company that got in trouble for a ‘‘tone deaf’’ email to renters at the beginning of the lockdown has claimed hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Government’s wage subsidy scheme.

Six Quinovic branches throughout the country have claimed $267,000 so far. The property management company has several other branches, which do not yet appear on the register.

Quionvic chief operating officer Paul Chapman said the owners of the Quinovic franchises claiming the subsidy had ‘‘made the decision to claim the wage subsidy as they have assessed their future revenue and considered that it was likely to drop sufficiently to meet the required Government thresholds due to the impact of Covid-19 and the level 4 lockdown’’.

A business has to have its revenue decline, or project its revenue to decline by 30 per cent compared to the same period of last year.

The company was blasted at the beginning of the lockdown for sending out an email to tenants reminding them that they must pay rent or likely receive a 14-day notice – something a renters’ group says is ‘‘tone deaf’’.

The letter said that Quinovic had a zero rent arrears policy and ‘‘if you are struggling to pay rent you must utilise the Government subsidies or contact the Ministry of Social Development’’.

The 14-day notice is a request the tenant pays their rent arrears within 14 days. Chapman defended the emails saying ‘‘where a tenant falls into arrears it is our standard process to contact the tenant to understand the tenant’s situation, empathise and seek practical solutions by mediating between tenants and owners’’.

We advise the tenant that it is a legal requirement under the residential tenancy act to issue a letter giving them a set time to remedy their breach of the RTA [Residential Tenancies Act], Chapman said.

The week the lockdown went into force the Government amended tenancy laws. Tenants now have 60 days instead of 21 before their landlord can take them to the Tenancy Tribunal.

Renters United spokesman Robert Whitaker who called the original email ‘‘tone deaf’’ said he couldn’t see how the revenue of property management companies had dropped.