Countrywide conveyancing. A warning!!!

[CuntyMcBollocks]

I want to warn as many people as possible so that they don't have to go through the turmoil that we and countless others have.

Our buyer was recommended this company by her estate agents. They have caused so much stress and unnecessary delays and have now lost us our house purchase and have cost us thousands in fees, lost mine and my husband's jobs due to not sticking to their completion dates twice, and will cost us a few thousand more in rent for temporary accommodation. We will then have to pay solicitors fees and searches fees AGAIN when we can reapply for another mortgage.

Our buyer has omitted the searches as she wanted a quick sale, and this should have taken around 6 weeks at the most. 6 months later there is still no completion date. They ignore all attempts of communication and lie about everything.

If anyone else is thinking of using them - DON'T!! Don't waste your time, money or ruin your mental health. Read the reviews on Trustpilot. They will cost you thousands as well as your sale.

Has anyone else had any dealings with them?

Hi

I’ve just stumbled across your post and just want to say firstly I’m really sorry for all that you’ve been through it sounds so stressful 😔

Secondly, we are selling our house and our buyers are using countrywide for a survey on our house which they’ve already rang up to rearrange twice 🥴

And also the sellers we are purchasing from are using them as their solicitors 🤦🏼‍♀️ feel like we can’t escape them. Not heard great things about them and worried the whole thing is going to go tits up!

They are part of the Bairstow Eves group.
They were useless pre-pandemic never mind now. I was talked into using them a couple of years ago and had to take them to small claims court to recover the money as they just failed to turn up twice.

"They are part of the Bairstow Eves group."

No, they're not.

I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole.

Sorry to hear they are causing you distress.

Yes. A long time ago- about 15 years- but basically they fucked up the version control on the deed of trust for the joint tenancy, and the one that was eventually signed and witnessed was incorrect. It took a lot of time and stress to unravel, and would have cost me tens of thousands lost to my ex if I hadn’t ploughed through all the versions to find what had gone wrong. As it was, it cost them a couple of grand compensating me for the distress and inconvenience. I would never use a conveyancing chain again.

The people we bought our house from used them. They were absolutely useless and incompetent at every step. What should have been a very simple, chain free sale took over six months.

Our own solicitor admitted that his heart sank whenever he got a sale where they were the other conveyancer.

@VeniVidiWeeWee

"They are part of the Bairstow Eves group."

No, they're not.

Okay Mrs Pedantic - Bairstow eves are part of countrywide; Bairstow Eves is a trading name of Countrywide Estate Agents, Registered in England Number 00789476

Countrywide are used by pretty much every bank and building society to do valuations etc and arrange conveyancing when completing mortgages for customers. They are absolutely massive therefore occasionally make mistakes. I fail to see how they've cost you thousands and lost you both your jobs though?

Anyway YANBU however this is like saying Scottish power are rubbish for example. An enormous company that I guess also sometimes make mistakes and cost people money. Its a shame but its true.

Scottish Power are rubbish though. They don’t ‘sometimes’ make mistakes; it’s all the time.

@Foxyloxy1plus1

Scottish Power are rubbish though. They don’t ‘sometimes’ make mistakes; it’s all the time.

But you could say the same for any massive company. Virgin media. Sky etc etc etc they'll always be people who have a great time and people who have massive problems 🤷‍♀️

They have ALWAYS been awful. I worked in conveyancing for years and on every case they were absolutely dreadful. Can never get hold of them and they didn’t know what they were doing.

Estate agents under the same umbrella as Countrywide push their sellers/buyers to use them. You don’t have to! You can choose your own solicitor/conveyancer.

@Foxyloxy1plus1

Scottish Power are rubbish though. They don’t ‘sometimes’ make mistakes; it’s all the time.

Yes!

They tried to charge my mum £8,000 for five years worth of electricity (long story), and then denied they were only allowed to send backdated bills for the previous 12 months. This was very recent.

Dreadful company.

To put an alternative point across...we used them 7 years ago with no issues whatsoever. Sorry you have had a bad experience

@Foxyloxy1plus1

Scottish Power are rubbish though. They don’t ‘sometimes’ make mistakes; it’s all the time.

You picked a very poor analogy there @ChangeChingyChange as Scottish Power are the worst utility company. Twice fined by ombudsman for massive failures in their billing and administration and mishandling of complaints. They still continue to make the same mistakes too. So not quite subjective opinion- they actually are incompetent

I'm so sorry this has happened to you OP.
Countrywide almost cost us our sale and purchase years ago.
We were pushed to use them by our estate agents (at the time we didnt realise they were part of the same company). To cut a long story short they did absolutely nothing on our file in 6 weeks & we nearly lost our sale due to it. When I realised I cancelled them & appointed a local solicitor who really pulled all the stops out for us and managed to save our sale and therefore our purchase too.
They are a complete disgrace. Please do push for compensation/your money back. It took me several months but I got a full refund from them. They couldn't really argue our refund as they admitted theyd done absolutely nothing on our file.

Sorry you're having issues with them OP. We used them 3 years ago and they were great

Pretty sure they did the survey for the remortgage on my apartment
Downvalued it by about 20k, surveyor had a face like a bulldog chewing a wasp the whole time and told me a private garden didn't add any value to an apartment as it was overlooked

VeniVidiWeeWee

"They are part of the Bairstow Eves group."

No, they're not.

Countrywide employee found.

We used them two years ago and they were ok. We live overseas which added complications and apart from having to chase them towards the end over a small issue, we didn’t have any problems. We had a direct contact who we could email or call.

We had experience of their rental side when we moved city and we're waiting to buy after we moved.

Absolutely awful as agents, we were always trying to get things fixed and they were just dreadful.

If you are buying, never ever use the conveyancer recommended by the estate agent. The estate agent wants buyers to use careless, cheap conveyancers who don’t look for or find issues. They want the sale to go through asap, with no pesky survey or boundary issues uncovered. The estate agent is paid for and acts for the seller. They want quick trouble free sales. They are not going to recommend buyers to the careful and thorough conveyancer.

Unusually in this case it is the seller who has been affected by the inefficient conveyancer which can happen too.