Tesco Could Face Legal Action Over New Property Site

Thu, 12 Jul 2007
 
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Tesco, the UK’s largest supermarket chain, could face a claim for hefty damages from an estate agency following allegations of copyright infringement.

Hannells estate agency claim that the retailer broke copyright laws by posting details of homes for sale on its new property website without the agency’s permission.

Lawyers for Hannells said that Tesco had been threatened with an injunction after the agency discovered that copies of photographs and details of its properties it had placed on the Fish4homes property website had also appeared on Tesco's website – Tescopropertymarket.com

Fish4homes decided to pull out of Tesco's online home selling website, just days after its launch last week, stating that it a large amount of negative feedback had been received from estate agency clients .

Tesco signed Fish4homes as a partner for their property business as they needed a significant number of homes to be listed from the first day in order to attract traffic. So far over a quarter of a million visitors have visited the property site, with around 2 million property pages having been viewed by potential buyers.

Mark Davis, Tesco Property Market’s managing director commented: "I've spent a decade working in the property industry and I can understand why estate agents might view Tesco's entry into the market with initial scepticism because competition can be tough. But it benefits consumers and makes businesses work harder for them."

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