We refer to the letter "Not clear what towns' abbreviations refer to on property website" (Oct 9) by Mr Brandon Zheng.

We thank Mr Zheng for sharing his feedback with us.

The Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) publishes the records of residential property transactions facilitated by property agents in Singapore, under the Property Agents' Transaction Records Initiative.

The records include information on the general location and type of property, type and completion month of transaction, and the party the property agent represented in the transaction.

This initiative allows property consumers to make informed decisions when choosing property agents to represent them.

For the general location of Housing Board flat transactions, CEA publishes the names of HDB towns in full.

Town abbreviations, which are used only as input data, are converted into full HDB town names in the CEA Public Register.

Owing to a technical glitch, the town abbreviations were not automatically converted into the full HDB town names before publication, affecting about 3,600, or 2.5 per cent, of the records published last month.

The issue was immediately rectified on Oct 9 and the full HDB town names for the affected records are now reflected in the CEA Public Register.

Soh Cheng Hwee

Director, Licensing

Council for Estate Agencies