From today conveyancers can easily add an Account & Entity Screen [1] search to their order with SearchFlow [2]; adding to the leading search provider’s portfolio offering and their commitment to deliver highly focused, in-depth property intelligence, quickly and efficiently to the conveyancing industry.
SearchFlow has over 25 years’ experience in the search industry, carrying out more than 1 million conveyancing searches every year for over 2,500 legal clients across England and Wales. Adding to its already comprehensive portfolio, SearchFlow can now offer enhanced due diligence via the Account & Entity Screen search from Lawyer Checker.
Greg Bryce, SearchFlow managing director comments:
“The service that Lawyer Checker addresses fits neatly into our portfolio offering here at SearchFlow, where we pride ourselves on providing the very best in innovative solutions to the conveyancing industry. In these uncertain and threatening times within the marketplace; it made sense to allow our users to have easy access to such a clear and easy search tool. We are pleased to reassure our users, that through their use of Lawyer Checker, they are getting the very best from us in risk management practices.”
In recent years, the threat of the cyber criminal and property fraud has grown exponentially. Each month we hear of a cyber attack on innocent house buyers and their conveyancers; a problem which the SRA is stating all firms must take seriously.
According to the regulatory body’s report, a quarter of all law firms have been a victim of cyber attacks with 10% of those experiencing money losses as a result. The threat of the bogus law firm is not looking like it is going away either; in just 4 years the number of reports regarding bogus firms has doubled with the SRA saying they now receive over 700 per year.
In a recent Experian report, it was stated that the level of mortgage and property fraud accounts for 6% of all fraud cases and this has increased by a massive 50% within the last year.
Implementing Lawyer Checker’s award winning Account & Entity Screen [1] aids firms and conveyancers in the fight against bogus firms and fraudsters. Due diligence is provided on all results that appear as Infrequent or Unknown; it is no longer enough to simply perform the due diligence out of necessity and not follow up on any red flags that may arise. The courts do not find this acceptable and neither will the professional indemnity insurers.
Paul Tucker, business development manager, Lawyer Checker states:
“Doing due diligence alone is not sufficient, there must be a risk management process in place to underpin the due diligence process. No one can afford to be an ostrich. You must be aware of the risks now; the courts will not find it an acceptable defence to say you did not know or that you were unaware.
If a problem occurs, you must show you did everything reasonable to establish the identity of the other side. Your risk management processes need to be robust; they should be clear and logical for the staff to follow and all grey areas need to be eliminated.
Lawyer Checker provides the tools to help assist firms in ensuring that they have the due diligence in place before releasing the client’s and lender’s funds. Our award winning anti-fraud solution allows firms to check that the bank details they are provided with is a bank account which has a history of use in conveyancing transactions. If it is not regularly seen in our database, and we cannot give the firm who requests the search immediate satisfaction to proceed with the transaction, then we will provide full due diligence on that firm.”