Search Code being seen as quality benchmark

The Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO) has confirmed their Search Code has reached its 100^th subscriber.

The Search Code offers reassurance to those relying on the information provided in property search reports that the searches they commission will be conducted in a professional and timely manner.

It also offers protection to reduce the circulation of fraudulent search reports and ensures that necessary insurances are in place, should an issue arise at a later date.

The Code sets out minimum standards, which organisations compiling and selling search reports have to meet.

All subscribers to the Code are listed on a register of subscribing firms, maintained by the PCCB and all display the trusted Search Code logo prominently on all search reports they produce.

Since it was launched in 2006, CoPSO and the Property Codes Compliance Board (PCCB), the Code’s regulator, have worked to raise awareness of the Code among lending and conveyancing communities.

The number of subscribers to the Code has steadily increased.

As more lenders make it a requirement that any private searches commissioned on their behalf are produced only by Code compliant subscribers, private search companies have become increasingly aware of the importance of subscribing to the Code.

James Sherwood-Rogers, Chairman of CoPSO said: “A big focus for us over the next year is to encourage even more lenders to make it a mandatory requirement that any conveyancer they instruct, must only commission and accept private sector search reports from Search Code subscribers."

CoPSO hope the number of subscribers continues to grow.

Andrew McIlwraith, Chairman of the PCCB, added: “It is important that everyone who relies on the information in a private search report can be totally confident that the report they have been provided with is from a trusted and reliable source.

“It is our role at the PCCB to ensure that every subscriber to the Code can provide us with evidence that they continually meet the strict criteria set out by the Code — a role we take very seriously.”