Missing certificate of completion, selling house

[alexmc123]

We are selling our house, which had a small extention built 8 years ago. It didn't require PP but the BC guy came aorund regularly, inspected the foundations and work during etc. and appeared at the end.

No certificate was issued at the time, it wasn't discussed as a requirement to have one.

The solicitors have now asked for a completion certificate, we said we don't have one, they said they contacted the council and it needs the final inspection(8 years later!) and that the council has an inspection fee of £352 odd left to pay(8 years later?).

It's a bit of a mess with a neighbour project managing, long disappeared builders, and an architect who drew the plans having had a huge house flood some years back! Not that that sems to matter as apparently the council don't issue a physical certificate unless you request and buy one.

My suspicion is that if the council have outstanding fees(allegedly) then they carried out the inspection and the certificate should have been granted. My wife would never have left a bill unpaid, it simply isn't her way.

I've had a quick google, and it seems that indemnity insurance is the other option, but you mustn't contact the council for it to be valid! Technically we haven't..... the solicitor did!

How long back do you have to go to be required to show completion certificates?

How can I find out if the certificate exists already, is there any method of searching on an address(ours)

If they did inspect and just didn't complete the certificate, can we make them do it if we pay the outstanding bill?

Does us not actually contacting the council ,ean we could still obtain indemnity insurance?

Many thanks in advance.

 

[paulf1976]

First of all it is still not a legal requirement for LABC depts to issue a Completion Certificate automatically on successful sign off of an application although there are plans to change this. That said the majority do and the cost of the certificate is coveted by your fees.

It is common practise for LABC's to withhold certs for unpaid debt. If you had a full plans application then your inspection fee would have been invoiced on commencement of the work. If you can find this date then you can check with your bank if you paid it or not. If you haven't paid it then you should realistically do so ad they have inspected your work. I'm surprised the council didn't send a debt collector after you as it is a reasonable amount of money.

If the LABC dept told your solicitor that a final inspection was needed then this is not uncommon after such time. Final inspections can occur several times if the previous ones had contraventions. I would assume the solicitor was told the truth.

Completion certs came in in 11th Nov 1985, but weren't 'standard issue on completion of work' until June 1992. Not all councils issue as standard and some still expect you to request at the end but from 1992 the price of a very must be in the cost of the application. I would assume the debt is holding up the cert and not that they want you to request one and pay for it's issue.

You can take indemnity but there is no guarantee any buyers will take it. You can search the BC public access website to see if the work is complete or not and/or contact the council land charges to pay for a partial search of just the BRegs info (Q1.1f-h, with 1.1g saying if the compliance certificate is issued. This should be about £10. The council want buyers to be aware but they want know who is requesting the info and it should preserve your indemnity.

If you pay your bill and all the work complies with the regs then the LABC team will gladly issue you a cert. If any inspections have been missed though the best you may get is a completion letter but this shook be enough to sell your house and serves as a firm of indemnity anyway.

Why go to all the bother of using building control and then take out indemnity. It seems contradictory and can cause suspicion to buyers.

Good luck.

 

[alexmc123]

Thank you for your response, very helpful.

My wife has contacted the council, and a final inspection has been arranged for next week. No further mention was made of any outstanding fees. If the costs were incorparated in the upfront fee from 92 on, then we should be fine as it was 2004 when the work took place. As I mentioned before, my wife just wouldn't leave any fees unpaid, it would be totally against her nature and as you mention, I doubt the council would leave it without contact, and we haven't moved anywhere in the intervening period.

Hopefully the guy will turn up, inspect, sign it off, and we're done? We have managed to pin down the build to a two month period, so will look up the bank statements from that period.

I suppose I'm not surprised that there's no standardisation across councils.... but it seems a no brainer, charge the fees up front, inspect the build, inspect at the end, issue a certificate! What would be wrong with that?

Thanks again.

 

[paulf1976]

There is standardisation in the way that fees are paid; a full plans application is paid in two parts, plan fee is up front when you submit your application, then when you start work the inspection fee is invoiced to you.

It's historical and it allows for the fact that some work never takes place after plans are approved. It also supports the LABC partnership scheme.

I hope all goes well.