An advertisement from a landlord saying he would accept ‘alternative payments’ from ‘attractive females’ who moved in to his property has been removed from the lodging website Spareroom.
The site - which issues press releases on the state of the housing market and calling for lodging reforms - nonetheless let an advertisement appear for a property in the Spinningfields suburb of inner Manchester.
Purporting to be from a landlord called Gerrard it featured images of a property which, it was claimed, would let out for £520 a week in usual circumstances. However, it would be free to ‘attractive females’ open to considering ‘alternative’ forms of payment.
The ad was taken down after a complaint by a customer service advisor at the website.
A website spokesman then told the City Life website that: “In principle we do allow people to offer discounted rates for rooms if their new tenant can also offer a specific service. In the past we have had people that have been after a flatmate that will clean, or perhaps help to look after a child.”
The spokesman continued: “In one case we had a music technician who offered a discount as long as the new roommate could help them catalogue their music collection. But in this particular case the offer of a discount did not seem appropriate, and so the listing was removed.”
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A damning error from Spareroom, I feel that their spokesman didn't really help matters with his response - 'in principle we do allow people to offer discounted rates for rooms if their new tenant can also offer a specific service'.
He really should have just simply apologised for the error instead of attempting to crawl out of the situation! Tut tut!
This almost made me chuckle it was so ridiculous! I bet someone is getting a good telling off for letting that one slip through the net and be allowed to be included on their website! Silly man!
Shock horror! Lonely man wants female company!
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