Dubai: Real estate brokers in Dubai have been told to stop direct calls to property owners not listed with them or to individuals as it annoys people, officials from Real Estate Regulatory Agency (Rera) and Dubai police said on Sunday.
Marwan Bin Gulaita, Engineer and CEO of (Rera), said they received complaints from investors and customers that such kind of calls annoyed them all the time.
“We have 2,113 brokers’ offices and 5,200 agents operating in Dubai. Imagine you receive calls from all of them. Such calls annoy the public and we should have to find solutions,” Bin Gulaita said during a workshop of property sector representatives organised by Dubai police.
According to Dubai Land Department, Dubai recorded real estate transactions worth Dh111 billion in the first half of 2018. Bin Gulaita said that they need to educate the brokers about not making direct calls to the public. “They call people at any time to promote properties and that’s annoying. When we receive the complaint, we issue a warning against the broker first time and a repeat offender can face a fine of Dh50,000,” he added.
A resident who was on a trip to Egypt received a call from a Dubai landline three times and when he answered it was a property broker.
“The resident didn’t answer the calls at the beginning but when he answered it was a broker offering him to run his property or to rent it for him. The resident told him that he doesn’t have any property in the UAE. Such kind of calls are annoying people even on vacations,” Bin Gulaita said.
Permission from Rera
He added that brokers need to go through customer services sessions to gain skills in promoting properties over the phone.
“The calls can be particularly distressing for those who have not advertised their property for sale. Our regulations state that brokers are not allowed to cause inconvenience to such property owners by using such unprofessional tactics.”
According to Bin Gulaita, real estate brokerage firms have to seek permission from RERA if they want to proceed with telemarketing and sending SMS messages.
“Calls and WhatsApp is not allowed at all.”
However, the workshop, held at Dubai Police officers club, focused on finding solutions to tackle the problem and property representatives cooperated with officials to find solutions saying such behaviour is affecting their industry.
Brigadier Salem Al Rumaithi, Director of the General Department of Criminal and Investigation at Dubai Police, said they also received complaints from public about the calls but he didn’t give a number of how many complaints registered recently.
“We received some complaints from people. People can lodge an official complaint if the calls disturbed or annoyed them,” Brigadier Al Rumaithi said.
