Final Countdown for Property Management Industry Licensing Regime Transitional Period
The Property Management Services Authority (PMSA) announced today that it has issued over 730 property management company (PMC) licences and over 14,100 property management practitioner (PMP) licences as the three-year transitional period under the property management (PM) industry licensing regime is left with around 10 days (up to 31 July 2023).
Starting from 1 August 2023, all PMCs providing properties subject to deed of mutual covenant (DMC) with more than one category of prescribed PM services, as well as PMPs serving managerial or supervisory roles in such PMCs to provide PM services, must hold valid PM licence in accordance with the Property Management Services Ordinance (PMSO) in order to continue to provide PM services after the transitional period. A PMC required to be licensed cannot act as a PMC if it does not possess a valid PMC licence. For relevant PMPs, one cannot act as a licensed PMP if he/she does not possess a valid PMP licence. Contravention is liable on conviction to a maximum fine of $500,000 and imprisonment for two years.
The majority of the licensed PMCs aforementioned provide properties subject to DMC with more than one category of prescribed PM services and are required to be licensed under the PMSO. A small number of them, which provide PM services to properties with no DMC, or provide not more than one category of prescribed PM services, or have not provided PM services to any property yet, have applied for licence on voluntary basis and are licensed under the PMSO.
Chairperson of the PMSA Dr James WONG said, “As of now, the PMSA has substantially completed processing applications in hand in respect of PMCs that are required to be licensed under the PMSO, while a small number of PMC licence applications submitted on voluntary basis under the PMSO are still being processed.”
Chairperson WONG emphasised, “If there are still individual PMCs in the market which provide properties subject to DMC with more than one category of prescribed PM services but have not been licensed yet, they should contact the PMSA soonest possible to follow up in order to avoid contravening the law after the transitional period. I also wish to appeal for members of the public to pay attention and verify whether the PMCs engaged by their properties are required to be licensed and whether they hold valid licence issued by the PMSA, so as to ensure that their PM services would not be affected after the transitional period.”
The PMSA has already informed all the 18 District Councils in Hong Kong last week about the licensing status of the PMCs engaged by properties in their respective districts.
As for PMPs, the PMSA has already issued over 14,100 PMP licences, whereby formal licences account for 69% and provisional licences account for 31%. Discounting around 2,100 provisional PMP licensees who have also obtained formal PMP licence and a small number of PMPs who hold more than one class of licences, over 11,500 PMPs have already been licensed.
Ends/Thursday, 20 July 2023
Issued at HKT 16:00
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