Successful no win, no fee surveyor claim
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Our client appointed a surveyor to carry out a full structural survey of a property they wished to purchase. The client happened to be present when the survey was carried out and was told that asbestos might be present in the artexing. However, this warning was not mentioned in the written report. The client tried to follow it up with the surveyor, but their emails went unanswered and their telephone number was blocked.
After moving in, the client had new central heating installed. When plumbers entered the floor void they found large piles of asbestos. An asbestos report was immediately obtained and this found evidence of asbestos in:
- the fireplace;
- the kitchen cupboards;
- the lagging to pipework under the ground floor;
- the lagging to pipework under the first floor; and
- the lagging in the attic void.
We agreed to take on the no win, no fee surveyor claim. But when we presented the claim to the surveyor he argued that structural surveys do not need to cover asbestos, and that certain areas of the property where unreachable. This was despite the fact that he had mentioned the problem to our client himself at the inspection. The surveyor also tried to argue that it was our client’s fault for not following up on their ‘roadside’ conversation.
However, we countered that the RICS’s own definition of a structural survey states that asbestos should be mentioned. No competent surveyor would have failed to detect the presence of the asbestos in the property and had the survey report included reference to this then the client would have followed it up. There had obviously been either a mistake/oversight when the inspection was done, or the inspection was not done at all.
Our arguments succeeded and the claim was settled out of court with our client receiving compensation.
