THE premises of an award-winning Bury estate agent were damaged by fire in a suspected arson attack late on Tuesday night.

The fire started at about 11pm and damaged property at the Stephen Burns and Company offices on Bolton Street.

It is though that paper was deliberately lit and pushed through the letterbox of the building to start the blaze.

The Best Independent Estate Agent title is competed for throughout the UK and Ireland and Stephen Burns and Company are the current holders.

Five people are employed at the business which has been open for only 17 months.

Fire affected only a small area of the office but the remainder was smoke damaged. Owner Steve Burns was concerned about possible damage to electrical business equipment caused by the smoke.

He was unable to assess the cost of the damage but stressed that repairs would be carried out quickly.

Work to reconnect telephones began immediately on Wednesday morning. Calls were being diverted to mobile phones but Steve stressed that customers would not be paying mobile rates for the calls.

He said: "I have no idea who could have done this to us, but the damage is superficial and we hope things will be back to normal within a week. In the meantime we will be open for business as usual and if cleaners come in we will just have to work around them.

"Fortunately none of the business files were damaged. We will be working to ensure that the fire causes the minimum amount of inconvenience to our clients."

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