RFD: create unmoderated newsgroup uk.tech.heating

[Ali Hopkins]

I think you've missed a point or two here. Solicitors, conveyancers and surveyors weren't civil servants last time I checked. The companies offering HIPS are very large commercial companies, who are quite happy to so so. NONE of the cost of a HIP is a tax, it will all go to commercial companies. The HCR training companies are also commercial. The only public sector involvement is the Land Charges Search, which is already done for any property. And, those searches may well be done as personal searches, which is a huge *commercial* industry. (If you get a CON 29 local authority one, they are more thorough, but the fee paid to the LA in no way covers the cost of provision, btw.)

And how is it flawed to have one single HIP paid for by one individual? The alternative is that each buyer commissions a HIP - much as is done now - and that is plainly daft. This system, btw, works very well indeed in other parts of the world, and is similar to the far more sensible Scottish paradigm. I think the jobsworths are those who oppose change for the sake of opposing it, and because it scares them. That's not aimed at you, btw, but some of the "professionals" who have been quite absurd in their scaremongering.

I am constantly amazed at how people buy the biggest purchase of their lives and don't do proper due diligence......

Ali

[Fentoozler]

I believe the proposed 'House Pack" may well require "Certificates of Notification" for each gas appliance (unsure about pipework) installed from April 2005, a DIY'er is unable to obtain a certificate as only CORGI registered installers can (correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not an installer). Indeed, a couple of years down the road, and I believe any gas appliance sold will be traceable, thus making DIY appliance installation very difficult. OFTEC have also recently introduced a certification scheme and I guess will follow the same path as CORGI.

Angus

PS: Just checked the CORGI Consumer website, and under the "Gas & the Law" heading, in a link found under the "Don't DIY" section, I found this text...

"The rules around gas have changed to protect you and your family further

There are two important changes in regulations, which affect all homeowners with gas appliances. These are designed to protect you further. If you are having a gas appliance installed or replaced, this is how the new rules affect you:

You will now receive a safety certificate (called a Declaration of Safety) from CORGI after a gas appliance has been installed. Please keep this safe as it proves the appliance has been installed by a professional. It will also form an essential part of the Home Information Pack, to be a legal requirement in England and Wales from 2007.

For more information about the introduction of the Home Information Pack visit

. The Scottish Executive is introducing a similar initiative for householders in Scotland called "Single Survey" scheme, for further information visit

You may also need to inform your Local Authority Building Control department of the work. This will have to be inspected and will cost up to £300. However, by using a CORGI Registered Installer that is able to self-certify, Local Building Control will be notified directly which should offer you significant savings. Check the back of your Installers ID card and look for the words, 'energy efficiency'. This applies to England and Wales only, ask your CORGI Registered Installer if Building Regulations is relevant to your work."

Maybe this RFD should be for a group called uk.tech.heating-appliances, as it looks as though DIY gas work will be limited to pipework only in the near future, if not outlawed by CORGI altogether???!!!

[Andy Hall]

I haven't missed any points. I didn't say that they were.

I'm sure they are.

Because it is paid for by the vendor. Are you commercially naive or something?

The existing system works perfectly well. All that is being done here is to add in a cost of sale which most people don't want and is fundamentally flawed.

I agree with you there. However, the principle of caveat emptor should always apply and this does not address that issue.

[Dr Zoidberg]

So your whole argument is that these surveyors will hear the vendor saying "here's an extra twenty quid" and ignore the obvious structural faults , even though they could be liable if their report is shown to be negligent or otherwise in error.

But as 99% of people are also buying at the same time it also introduces a saving as well, and under the present system each time a survey is done and the sale does not complete this is money wasted that would not be done under the new one.

[Ali Hopkins]

Precisely. And, of vourse, the vendor would be criminally liable as well. One of the Fraud Acts, hm?

It's also aimed at cutting the number of sales that simply fall through due to our insane current process. I don't have the precise figures to hand, but it's around the thirty percent mark. The goal is to drastically reduce the time and hence the risk. There's also a lot of work being done on chain analysis, too. The aim is to move to full blown e-conveyancing, which works very well in places like British Columbia.

Ali

[Andy Hall]

Two points.

It is bad commercial practice for a purchase on this scale to rely on any form of quality report, survey or anything else unless one pays for it. As a potential purchaser, *I* want to be in control of what is surveyed and under what basis, ans *I* want to pay for it.... not the vendor and especially not the government.

A set of surveys done to a standard formula will become a rubber stamping exercise where the suppliers of them will have standard paragraphs of weasel words designed to protect them.

I would rather waste a few hundred quid on an abortive survey than to trust something commissioned by the vendor under government guidelines.

[Paul Harper]

Absolutely. Hopefully my next house move will be to Spain, but if it in this country, an expense of a few hundred pounds in an overall investment of several hundred thousand is worth it.

Paul.

[Andy Hall]

Oh yes of course. Do you really believe that there won't be standard library paragraphs of descriptions that will sound convincing to a potential purchaser but which mean bugger all and certainly can't be followed up legally?

The moment that you have something like this paid for by a vendor, the opportunity for corruption exists. I am not suggesting that it will often take place, but it is nevertheless there because the purchaser is neither paying for, nor selecting the organisation doing the work.

It does not require an overly complex, formulaic, government sponsored gravy train to achieve this. All that would be required is to alter the order in which things happen.

The simple formula is that offers are made on a property. Included in the offer are any conditions that the purchaser wishes to specify - e.g. subject to surveys, financing and a time limit. Once the vendor accepts the offer, he may not place the property back on the market. Equally, the purchaser does have to proceed with the surveys etc. in the offer.

This means that the vendor can evaluate the whole offer and choose rather than having government meddling and unnecessary extra cost. The purchaser chooses his own set of surveys and satisfies himself, based on criteria that he and his professional advisor decide on - not the vendor and the government.

[kat]

And naturally that makes it all right. I don't know, I don't think I'd want the hassle of having to sue and anyway, without another report it might be difficult proving some things.

I don't think the risk is that the vendor will be doing bungs, rather that the buyer can't be sure, and might feel happier having it all done again, by someone employed by himself and therefore clearly on his side.

We did it by post last time. It was fascinating, because we took more notice of what we were sent by the solicitor, rather than sitting in his office just signing where he said sign. I spent a happy hour reading the deeds. Be a shame not to have those any more.

[Geoff Berrow]

Message-ID: from Andy Hall contained the following:

Works well enough for cars with the MOT certificate.

[John Rumm]

You won't even require corruption as such. If you do your own survey and it finds things you would rather not make public, you can simply have more done until you find one that fails to identify the major faults. You can then truthfully present the results of that survey and discard the rest.

[Ali Hopkins]

At about £300 for the survey element, it might just be cheaper to fix it.... !

Ali

[DJC]

And an MOT proves nothing. Buying a cr 'with long MOT' merely means you may get away with driving a working but unsafe car for several months until it fails ts next MOT. And that's assuming the MOT is genuine.

[Douglas de Lacey]

Hey, guys. I think it's an excellent idea for all discussion of uk.tech.heating to be done on both uk.net.news.config and uk.d-i-y. But I doubt that those avidly scannig uk.net.news.config are terribly interested in MOTs or surveys of Spanish houses (frex). (Actually they aren't very d-i-y relevant either.) Please trim the headers to your posts if you aren't actually discussing uk.tech.heating. FWIW I think a uk.tech.heating group would be interesting for me though I have no qualifications or CORGI registration; however I suspect if it doesn't come about then those who might have used it would post in uk.d-i-y anyway.

fu set to uk.d-i-y since I suspect most responses will not be relevant to uk.net.news.config

Douglas de Lacey.

[Wm...]

Tue, 27 Dec 2005 09:41:18 uk.net.news.config kat

I've always thought things like that should be accompanied by tea or coffee rather than cocktails.

[Tony Bryer]

According to reports only 20% of people agree with you; the rest just rely on the mortgage valuation.

[Paul Harper]

That's their choice. The 20% that agree with me are probably the 20% in my price bracket.

Paul.

[kat]

In news:mQ4UPkH+YUsDFwSU@[127.0.0.1], Wm... said

It was happy because I was in bed. ;-)

[Wm...]

Tue, 27 Dec 2005 14:39:55 uk.net.news.config kat

I am sure It was. No accounting for pet names.

[Ali Hopkins]

And the ones with sense, frankly. Mortgage "surveys" are of no use whatsoever in assessing what might be needed to be done on a house.

Ali