News and General 10th June 2025

In the coming weeks we'll be adding a "source of funds" product to support our ID checks. We need to hook up the programming & confirm the pricing but this new product will be live in June. You'll be able to order it through the AML tab. Interesting times. JH 

And we've received our first "topless ID" of the month (3rd June). We might put a comment on our ID checks asking people to keep their clothes on when taking selfies !   

Southern Water have advised they will be increasing their prices for Official Water and Drainage Searches from 28th May, so our individual search prices have increased accordingly. Also, Thames Water have notified us of prices rises from the 4th June.

United Utilities CON29DW Delays. Official Water and Drainage Reports (CON29DW) from United Utilities are being returned much slower than usual. We have contacted United Utilities regarding this and they have apologised and advised the delays are due to staff shortages at the moment. 

Personal Searches;

Completed Personal Searches are a combination of data obtained from different Council departments, specifically; Building, Highways, Land Charges and Planning. Some data is available online, other information needs sending to us by the Council, and in certain situations we need to visit the Council's offices to retrieve the data we need.... and Councils can make search agents wait for available appointment slots. ie. all search firms are in the same boat (so to speak). 

Official Search Prices;

Please contact us to double check pricing. There are around 350 Local Authorities in England and Wales, each with different fees for CON29R, LLC and the 19 CON29O optional questions. Very few of these Local Authorities notify us prior to increasing their fees.

The current average turnaround times (over the past 90 days) for Personal Local Searches is 15 working days. Please note, this can vary depending on individual Local Authorities and their ability to return the data we need. Details of councils where we're experiencing delays are listed below:

Council News. 

Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Councils; The current turnaround time is 45 working days due to council IT issues.

Colchester Council are experiencing delays following the scheduled essential maintenance on their systems. We can offer search delay and no search indemnities; to discuss these options please contact Emily at indemnities@legalbrokers.com for further information.

East Staffordshire have increased to a 30 working day turnaround time for Personal and Official Local Searches due to experiencing issues beyond their control. They are advising chases only be sent after this time has passed. 

Hackney are not accepting "full" Local Search requests at present. There is still the option of a Partial Search, to discuss this further email kath@legalbrokers.com. Alternatively, we  can offer a Search Delay Indemnity Policy for £30 plus IPT, please contact indemnities@legalbrokers.com for further information.

Harrogate Council have emailed us to say they've struggled with a software upgrade (in April) and their processing time for new searches is 30 days. 

Lancaster City Council are currently working with HMLR to migatre their data to the central Land Charges register. Searches are therefore being delayed and the council are unable to confirm an accurate response timeframe. 

LB of Redbridge are experiencing delays in returning information for personal searches. Current turnaround time is apptroximately 30 working days

LB of Richmond upon Thames are having technical issues with public access Local Plan, Building Control, and Planning Databases, and are working on a fix.

Manchester have returned to normal service. They cannot promise anything under the standard 20 working day EIR turnaround, but the majority of search requests are being returned within 15 working days.

Oldham Council have resolved software issues they were experiencing, and we are currently finding they are returning information earlier than expected. However, we are expecting their turnaround time to increase due to their upcoming migration to the Land Registry. We will continue to monitor the situation.

Rochdale Council's online local planning system is not working; the issue has been raised with the council. We now have a solution to this and we are working to complete Local search reports.

Sheffield Council have advised -  Due to staff shortages  we will be experiencing increased timescales for sending out all searches (both full and personal) from now until further notification, which we anticipate at times could go up to around a 25 working day turnaround. We do not envisage that we will be in a position to undertake any expedited searches during this period so please enquire prior to sending this type of request in. If the situation changes we will let you know. Please be assured that we are trying our best to process your requests as quickly as possible and are working hard to reconfigure our resources to minimise the delays.Thank you for your patience, please avoid chaser emails and phone calls until the 25 day period as expired,  as this causes further delay.

Stratford-On-Avon are experiencing delays in returning Official Local searches due to a technical issue in the Highways Department.

Stoke-on-Trent have reduced their return time for Official Searches from 35 working days down to 20 working days

St Albans are experiencing delays of up to 25 days in returning Personal Searches.

Tameside Council Official Searches have reduced down to a 3-4 week turnaround.

Walsall Council are gradually speeding up and turn around time has reduced from 40 working days to 30 working days.

New Builds. In some circumstances the development and properties will be registered with the Land Registry (which is where our data comes from) and the site will be able to identify each property. If the Land Registry hasn't got the data we'll need a Plot plan, Location plan, and Development plan. ie. we need to find the property with reference to existing roads and infrastructure. 

In some circumstances it may be quicker to order an Official Search rather than a Personal Search. Officials are generally more expensive, but the Council may offer a faster turnaround time. Please email kath@legalbrokers.com if you have an urgent search requirement.

UK Finance Lenders Handbook. This is available as a stand alone search and an item which can be added to existing bundles. On our order page we will need to know the mortgage lenders name to provide the search. Please contact kath@legalbrokers.com if you would like this adding to you bundle. It's free of charge within bundles!  

We understand that there are unfortunately times that searches have to be cancelled. To make sure your request is received and dealt with promptly, please send all cancellation requests and queries to searches@legalbrokers.com as this email is monitored daily by all members of staff.

Kind Regards

Stacey Armitage

Searches Department

Tel: 0345 603 0708