Two British Columbia realtors have been fined by the provincial regulator due to problems in how they identified themselves on their social media accounts.
InfoNews.ca reports the BC Financial Services Authority (BCFCA) decisions fined realtors Xin Bo (Angela) Guo $4,000 because she used “Angela Guo Realtor” and “Angela Guo PREC” on different social media accounts and said on her Instagram account that she was a “Top 1% President Club Member.” The BCFCA complained that Guo’s Instagram page “did not indicate the basis, source, date, or qualifying information for her receipt of the Top 1% President Club Membership award. These representations included no qualifying information that would specify on what basis these awards were granted. Without that qualifying information the public could easily have concluded that these awards concerned times, volumes of transactions, or other qualifying criteria that they did not.”
Separately, realtor Craig Veroni was fined $6,250 for a similar reason.
“Mr. Veroni’s Instagram page, which had the name ‘Craig Veroni REALTOR,’ stated ‘Award winning REALTOR’ in the bio portion without any information regarding what awards he received or how he qualified for those awards, and did not state his brokerage’s name,” the BCFCA declared, adding that it was “necessary to ensure the nature of those awards is clearly communicated and the public is not misled into believing the awards indicate more than they actually do.”
Both realtors sought to appeal their fines but were rejected by the regulator.
