DS's mortgage application has been delayed because his lender's valuation report from Countrywide Surveyors reported that the Share of Freehold flat he is purchasing has a large Service Charge. It doesn't. At our request, the lender has asked the surveyor to review this information, but has not received a response after a week. Possibly they are on holiday, or maybe they are just unresponsive. In the meantime, the application is in limbo.
My questions are:
How Surveyors determine service charges? There is nothing in the public accounts, and they didn't ask the Estate Agent. (If they had, they would have been told there was no Service Charge). Do they use estimation?
Do Countrywide Surveyors have managers that queries can be escalated to when they don't respond to their corporate customers, or are they all independent surveyors?