PARTY WALL HELL. Help :(

[SenoraSurf]

Simple party wall agreement needed with elderly neighbour for our permitted delevlopment extension.

Notice issued and the neighbour disputed and didn't agree to having 1 surveyor so there are 2 surveyors involved.

Award is now ready to be signed (after 10 weeks due to neighbours surveyor being very slow to respond). The neighbours surveyor also spent almost double the time with the neighbour during the site visit, which was deemed unnecessary by our surveyor.

Our surveyor is charging £700+vat but neighbours wants to charge £1400+vat?!?!?? Our surveyor believes this is unreasonable but our options are as followed:

1. Get a third surveyor to agree his prices are unreasonable (this could cost at least +£300 more) so we end up paying neighbours surveyor less. Means award is delayed by a further 2 weeks, delaying the build.

1. Pay it so award gets signed and submit a complaint to RICS in the hope of some compensation but this is unlikely but means no further delays to the build

Any advice please? So livid as this is exactly what neighbour wanted (it to take a long time and cost us a lot of money). They're a very bitter neighbour as do not want change.

Yes. £1400 plus vat is unreasonable. I would be wondering what’s going on here.

Why don’t you get someone you know to phone up the expensive surveyor and ask for a quote for a PWA? Not you, obviously. Also contact RICS and see if they have any form of standard fees for this work. Both surveyors have done the same work.

If the “friend” gets a lower quote, I would dispute the fee with the surveyor. You are paying. If they won’t budge, ask for a breakdown of fees and expenses. If you are building a basement though, this would be more onerous.

You can’t complain to rics about someone else’s surveyor (even if you pay). Our neighbours party wall surveyor was an inept, lying cunt and charged about what you suggest.

Our surveyor had a fee of £140p/h whereas the neighbours said £120 p/h. Our surveyor said he spent around 6 hours on the award but their surveyor has listed over 11 hours.

No idea what to do.

If you want a quick resolution so you can proceed with the work - pay the bill.

If you're prepared to wait to start work then you can challenge the invoice. I'd start by asking for a breakdown of charges.

I think you'll have to pay it - you accept that the neighbour's surveyor did in fact spend double the time with the neighbour (needed more explanation etc, what the process was). Whilst its grating, its £700 plus VAT which is a small amount probably compared to the build cost.

Just pay it. You won't be able to build without it.

I didn’t say complain to RICS. I said see if they have standard fees for this work. It could be travelling, talking etc cost money.

The other thing to bear in mind is that this surveyor has got what you want. Maybe your neighbour was unreasonable and had to be talked down? A cheaper fee per hour isn’t always a cheaper overall fee. But, yes, if you want to build, it’s not a massive amount in terms of costs so I guess you have to pay it. You can ask for justification for 11 hours though but it might save you from angst to just pay it!

Unfortunately I think this is one bill you will have to swallow - make a note of any bill sent and when final invoice due you can make notes & potentially say something - but neighbour is allowed to have her own pw surveyor ( what is it as a % of entire build , I would have thought delays will cost you more than the difference between £700 +VAT & £1400 + VAT. ) Not entirely fair but I would say pragmatism is the best way here

Just pay it. I had a pain in the ass owner of the buy to let next door. I needed to put two scaffolding poles on his hard standing (property was empty) and briefly stand on his roof to do repairs to my roof. He insisted I use his scaffolders, appointed his own surveyor who charged £1000. He had the ability to delay me by weeks do I just took it. Nasty man but it really wasn't worth me fighting.
If there are people who have to big themselves up by doing this kind of thing just think how pathetic their lives are.

@Africa2go

I think you'll have to pay it - you accept that the neighbour's surveyor did in fact spend double the time with the neighbour (needed more explanation etc, what the process was). Whilst its grating, its £700 plus VAT which is a small amount probably compared to the build cost.

I think what they mean is going by the rates per hour and the hours listed. The other surveyor apparently spent twice the amount of time on there job.

Sympathy. My elderly neighbor was the same. Cost me 1600 pounds

Been in this nightmare. Elderly neighbour made it into a hobby to object to our 3 m extension, and was measuring with a tape measure everyday of the build. Don't worry and persevere. She will make you lose time and money but law is on your side, she has to sign it. I found out she hired another surveyor and hired the same to reduce costs (she said she hired someone she trusted 'from before'. Surveyor never heard of her before) . In your case its too late, so just swalliw the cost and follow the process...

Sympathies, that's a big Bill.

We've just had a Party Wall Surveyor draw up a PWA, it was £840 + VAT as my neighbour needed a fair bit of chasing and there are special conditions regarding the ground (our houses are built on very rocky ground).

Our surveyor wouldn't quote a price as he said that the time taken can vary massively, so he only quoted an hourly rate.

Our neighbour is selling so dilly dallyed about signing to use our surveyors (I think he was hoping the sale would go through before he had to deal with it!). Luckily I know the purchasers so I popped round to have a chat with them and they pushed from their side to use our surveyor rather than have another one appointed. Given your costs I think I owe them a rather nice bottle of wine when they move in!

I would pay so things could proceed ASAP

I'd guess the surveyor went round and part of his bill is for sitting having a cup of tea and a natter.
Pay the bill and get moving on the works, lodge the complaint with RICS.

Steve the party wall surveyor here. Another option is to agree the award without a specific fee and then debate the fee after it is signed. It is very poor practice to hold up an award over a fee dispute and a third surveyor wouldn't permit this. You could also award say £1000 while the balance is subject to discussion. If the other surveyor refuses to sign the award ask the third surveyor ti sign it for them.

For a simple rear extension I would expect a neighbors surveyor to need no more than 6 hours and a fee of no more than 1100 plus VAT. Having a cup of tea and spending three hours reassuring elderly neighbours is not that unusual but is not a reasonable cost, if her surveyor wants paying for that he should invoice your neighbour.

The unscrupulous pitch slightly over this in the hope you will simply pay. RICS are not interested in this kind of dispute I'm afraid, they do very little to protect those of us (and that'll be most chartered surveyors) that who surveyor form the actions of these clowns. Anyone can be a party wall surveyor with little or no training, PI insurance or ability.

And, note to all, beware. as soon as you put a planning app in there are some firms of "surveyors" ambulance chasers who will rain very official looking correspondence upon all affected neighbours scaring them into making appointments that are always excessively costly.

Hi everyone, thanks for replying to my original post. We ended up sucking up the bill and paying the cost to get it done with to save any more delays.

We have submitted notice and are ready to proceed with our build but the neighbour has now insisted we include some old document she is only willing to share a segment of, to our insurers. We have asked for the full document but she has refused. The document says that a few years ago a damaged drain caused some cracks and sticking doors in her house. Insurers arrange repairs for this damage as well as repair to the drains. Her surveyor thinks it's a reasonable request and ours thinks that it is unreasonable, based on the award haven't been already prepared signed and the notice period expired. The award states we should show evidence of adequate insurance cover in place to protect the the adjoining owner against any damage incurred as a result of the works (we gave Evidence of our home insurance as well as the builders full public liability insurance). These documents were deemed acceptable once we passed them on.

The neighbours surveyor is insisting because both surveyors are in disagreement that we get a third surveyor in to determine who is right and whether this document is of any relevance. I didn't think this was possible given that the award is already finalised.

Am I right in thinking the only way the neighbour could stop works is if they got an injunction? We believe we've done everything right as per the award and provided the necessary documents, as does our surveyor. It feels like she's just trying to delay everything, especially as she has waited two months to then give this document only once we have given notice to build.

Any advice please?

Steve the party wall surveyor again... I would probably agree with your surveyor. The fact that your neighbour may have had some work done is largely irrelevant to you and your work, your household insurance may well exclude construction work. In any event unless your neighbours are named on the policy they would not be able to claim on it.

If the surveyor next door is RICS he is on sticky ground because it could be construed as insurance advice which we cannot give. This can only come from a CII advisor.

I would try an avoid getting dragged into this. You are right they could insist on an injunction, they might feel the £5k minimum cost whether or not successful might bout them off... (and those costs are not recoverable in full if they succeeded). But I'm not convinced they would succeed on an insurance point. The work is awarded in accordance with the notices. If I were the third surveyor I probably (because I haven't got all the info) would come down on your side.

As I'm sure you realise I cannot give proper professional advice in the absence of details and background but I might be inclined in push on with the build and see what happens?

Agree with Steve, had a scenario where the award got issued, with fees disputed. Third surveyor agreed with an initial dispute point, and before they could come back on last and final point about fees - the second surveyor agreed to reduce their fee to £1000 approx from almost £2k!!! for a basic build. Glad I challenged it, and had a window of time before the builder started the work to do so. Part of my motivation was to send a message to nightmare neighbour, who started to lose perspective and act like it was their build and that they could make all the decisions including on things that had no bearing on the party wall or award - and who had pretty much said it was their way or the highway. So to a certain degree, knowing that a third surveyor was starting to determine things, and agree with me, just tempered their sense of no boundaries. In many ways I wish the surveyor had come back on the final point on the fees as it would probably have meant they would have felt a direct consequence of taking what was clearly a hostile approach in the first place (to the same building work that they completed 2 years previously!!!! without a party award in place).

Thank you both. It's all a mess. The AO surveyor contacted the third surveyor himself without telling ours so now he can't be used as he's not impartial. After seeking advice from experts and a legal expert, we're basically going ahead and waiting to see what happens as neighbours seems to be planing an injunction etc.

Absolutely mess :(