Connells Reviews

2.9

28% would recommend to a friend

(408 total reviews)
avatar

David Plumtree

31% approve of CEO

39% positive business outlook

Connells has an employee rating of 2.9 out of 5 stars, based on 408 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The Connells employee rating is 23% below average for employers within the Real estate industry (3.8 stars).

Reviews by job title

408 reviews
1.0
9 Jul 2019
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The ability to get out the office to purchase tea, coffee and milk....

Cons

In general, there is am immorally corrupt culture that exists within this company. Favoring someone to complete a mortgage with Connells over a cash buyer thereby purposely delaying putting cash offers to vendors as they know a mortgage buyer will attract commission for the company. Advertising shared ownership properties but failing to disclose important material facts such as a large cash premium required to purchase the property in advance of a mortgage application. Sending threatening legal letters to employees should they even speak to any potential future employer(s) regardless that the current employee approached the potential new employer about a job role. Incredible pressure on sales targets bordering on bullying from senior management and to the detriment of the clients. Treating employees with mental health issues in an unfavorable manner and with little compassion. No sick pay whatsoever, understandable if you have time off for a cold for example but if you suffer a life-threatening accident and you are hospitalised in a foreign country and completely immobile for weeks, lost your family in said accident and feel like life could not get any worse – then it really does not matter to Connells of your circumstances or length of service, you have to simply rely on the statutory sick pay allowance provided by the Government. Fantastic if you have a young family to support and a mortgage to pay for…. Cost-cutting. Water coolers and the office cleaners have been taken away leaving employees having to drink from kitchen sink (untested pipes) and informing employees that they are having to empty bins, clean toilets, wash and hoover up at the end of each working day. This had to be completed outside of office working hours and indeed outside of any contractual agreement, or you would be reprimanded for not hitting your sales targets. If you have the desire to go into estate agency as ‘a number’ then do not hesitate in applying for a Connells role. Quite simply, please consider all alternative options before joining this company.

1.0
2 Mar 2024

Company needs investigation

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Aspects of estate agency are nice, working with nice customers etc

Cons

The company is abysmal. The management are basically con artists who will sell you a dream at your interview. Their job adverts allude that you will be earning 30-40k salary, in the interview they make the commission structure so hard to follow that again you believe the earning potentials to be as high as 40k a year. In reality you start on 17-18k basic and you will struggle to make more than that. As it is in fact less than minimum wage they give you a “top up” which could be around £400. But when you manage to scrap a £50-£100 commission a month it just eats into your minimum wage top up which means earnings pretty much always end up the same? Connells don’t realise this gives you no real incentive to actually achieve commission. The amount of work you’d need to put into achieving top commission is absolutely impossible, there’s physically not enough time in the day to do everything they expect of you. The only real incentives you’ll get is an area manager holding meetings every two weeks to tell you you’re not doing enough and you need to do more in order for her to get her end of year bonus! Really motivating! Even managers will fix their figures etc just to keep higher managers off their backs. Constant hounding from area manager about targets and little care actually for the job in itself, they just want you to sell anything for their gain. Top managers even suggest things like not conducting viewings on Saturdays or not to spend any time sales chasing as “it’s not making them money”. They want you to abandon any customer service and care. It’s essentially a pyramid scheme, the people at the bottom slave away working 8:30-6pm and weekends to feed into the people at the tops pockets and you will not reap the rewards or your hard work. There are some people on decent salaries but they offer everyone different salaries making an unfair working environment. You don’t have a yearly salary review, but if you do want to increase your salary just hand your notice in and they will 99% of the time try and get you to stay by offering you a slightly better salary. Everyone on decent salaries has been there for 6+ years just to earn around 22-23k. Don't waste your time! People at the top don’t realise what the teams in branch have to deal with on a daily basis. It’s poorly run and having worked in numerous different industries the abuse you get from customers is by far the worst I’ve ever received. All management do is tell you “you need a thicker skin”. They’re right you do need a thick skin for the job, but you definitely don’t have to deal with the daily abuse if you’re earning less than minimum wage. Plenty of companies out there who will pay you a decent salary to begin with and treat you like a human.

1.0
13 Feb 2019

Worst job I ever had

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

If you work incredibly hard (and get a bit lucky) you can make money.

Cons

- Awful work atmosphere - Training was minimal, no effort was made to help support new members of staff - Base pay is barely enough to live on the first few months when you don't have some sales under your belt, and car allowance is nowhere close to covering how much money you spend driving around.

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Glassdoor has 410 Connells reviews submitted anonymously by Connells employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Connells is right for you.