[1]For 6 years we’ve been sitting on the fence, advocating neither Official (Council) nor Personal (Regulated) local authority searches. However, with the introduction of VAT on council produced CON29s we’re changing our position.
While we continue to provide our trademark choice of local authority searches (we offer Officials as well as 5 Personal search providers), we are now strongly recommending Personal local authority searches, in almost every case… Why?
In addition to the VAT rise making Official searches (even) less price competitive, the following factors have influenced our new position:
- Lenders: with the imminent launch of our exclusive Lender Approved Guarantee (see below) lender acceptance is no longer an issue
- Reliability: hundreds of thousands of local searches have gone through our system over the years, and we’ve seen no evidence that “Officials” are more accurate than “Personals”
- Security: we only provide Personal searches from solid companies. In the case of the SearchFlow personal search, SearchFlow are part of DMGT, a multi-billion pound business founded in 1922 – your search couldn’t be in safer hands
- Progress: Personal search companies continue to innovate, their products are now better and clearer to interpret than ever. CLICK HERE for a sample report [2]
- Consistency: Personal searches offer consistency of price, service and format
- Regulation: as we only offer Personal searches from suppliers that are members of the Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO) and subscribers to the Search Code, this ensures that searches are of the highest possible quality
- Recourse: should anything go wrong with a Personal search, it is easier to get satisfaction than with an Official search
- Completeness: Personal search companies now have access to exactly the same data as councils
- Value: Personal searches have always been more cost effective than Officials, making quotes more competitive
- Efficiency: our new SearchFlow Enhanced local authority search automatically contains details of all Section 38 and 106 agreements, as well as planning permission conditions etc, removing the need to contact the council for this information later
- Service: all our Personal search providers are consistently easy to deal with and are customer focused
Lender Approved Guarantee
Under our new Lender Approved Guarantee, if a lender does not accept a Personal search then we will automatically order an Official, all AT NO EXTRA COST. This service will launch next week.
The ETSOS exclusive SearchFlow Enhanced search also launches next week and includes, in addition to their Personal local authority search, Section 38s, 106s and planning conditions as standard.
Try one of our range of Personal searches today. Contact David Opie on 01524 220001 to set up your FREE ETSOS account.