Question: Who Pays Party Wall Surveyors Fees?
Answer:
The surveyor or surveyors will determine the fees typically in conjunction with the costs of the works. Therefore they typically lie with the Building Owner (person/s carrying out the works).
Where counter-notices have been served and works carried out at the request and expense of the Adjoining Owner (person/s adjacent to the works), surveyors fees in conjunction with the required benefit of the Adjoining Owner and where work was undertaken outside of the requirements of that which was needed to satisfy trespass, nuisance, structural, safety or easements required for the Building Owner to carry out the works, the Adjoining Owner will be required to both pay for the extra works and the time of the surveyor preparing the fair determination of the matter.
The Building Owner will also, typically, be required to pay the fee’s of sub-consultants necessary for the Award to be determined. It is important to understand that Surveyors appointed under the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 are required to act under that function alone.
Reading your professional’s Terms of Engagement [Contract] will give you an indication of what they do and what they do not do, disciplines could be seen to be separated into three different areas including but not limited to: Design, Construction & Engineering and perhaps, in the case of larger projects, CDM. Party Wall is a professional service area in and of itself and Contracts will often limit the involvement of the Party Wall Surveyor to neighbourly matters only, matters normally dealt with in Tort Law. Strictly speaking such contracts cannot limit the risk of death or personal injury as a result of contract through statutory legislation and therefore surveyors may be held, at least, jointly liable in the event of death or personal injury dependent on the nature of the construction project.