Understaffed company that doesn't deliver

Very poor experience as a renter, and if you are a property investor I would highly recommend you do not use their services.

I was renting an apartment that was managed by Pretor Group. I paid my deposit, and monthly rent throughout the year as was expected. There were issues during the year that would go unanswered for days at a time. One such example was a burst pipe in the back passage. I sent pictures of the water bubbling to the surface to our contact, and a week later of the water flowing at a much higher rate, even more pictures were sent. It took almost 3 full weeks for them to finally get someone out to take a look at the issue. At the end of the full year, we opted to move into a bigger place and after an inspection took place with us present we handed over the keys and went on our way. Several days after vacating we followed up with our contact by email on when we will receive our deposit back. No response. I then followed up via phone, and was told our contact was out sick. I explained that we were looking for our deposit back and that surely someone else can help us. Our details were taken but again no follow up response. 19 days after vacating, I yet again phoned Pretor group and finally got through to our contact. He said he will check on the inspection notes, as he hasn't looked at them yet. He phoned back about an hour later to inform me there was damage to the unit and that we will need to either fix it ourselves or it will come out of our deposit. The damage entailed ***** holes where we placed curtain holdbacks. I informed him that he has no claim to our deposit, nor will I fix damage that he has only noticed just now. The law in South Africa stipulates 14 days for the leasor to notify the lessee and affect repairs in order to return the remaining deposit. I informed him he was already 5 days in breach of this and is in no position to make this request, I then asked that the full deposit including interest be returned to us given these circumstances. He refused, and would not budge on his position. Communication continued several times without him making any further move, and to date 9 months later, we are still without our deposit back. We moved out December 2017, and our last communication was in January 2018. It is now September 2018. It's a sad state of affairs that a company will hold on to someone's money with supposed impunity.