Surveyor Recommendations?

Karouise said:
Unfortunately the East Coast Forum's surveyor of choice (from posts I have seen in past) Martin Evans is committed until end of first week in December and I want to get survey done quicker than this.

Can anyone suggest a surveyor? Vancouver 27/4 - GRP / long keel - in Fox's Ipswich?
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The chap Adrian from Robertsons in Woodbridge
 
John HH21 said:
Well it was the cheapest out of the five quotes I had (not that that was the reason I used him) so I consider it to be cost effective.....unless you can tell me otherwise?
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I was just wondering if he hammered the vendor to save you £s, that`s all.
I have used Martin Evans ever since he surveyed my previous boat for the new owner. A very fair survey & nothing i didnt know about, all fairly written up with no axe to grind @ my expense.
 
sailorman said:
I was just wondering if he hammered the vendor to save you £s, that`s all.
I have used Martin Evans ever since he surveyed my previous boat for the new owner. A very fair survey & nothing i didnt know about, all fairly written up with no axe to grind @ my expense.
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I did get all new standing and running rigging done as well as loads of other stuff...but this was more by mutual agreement rather than a sound hammering!!
 
Whoever you use, make sure he (or she) is prepared to come up with definitive statements, not value judgements. The last time we used a surveyor, he came back with a report that identified several things that he was unhappy about but said "I don't think these are likely to be a problem" - As I pointed out to him, this was just about the worst thing he could have done - he got me worried about possible problems but gave me neither the ammunition to pull out of the transaction or sue him on his professional liability insurance if the items identified did prove to be serious problems at a later date. I ended up writing him a letter asking that he should categorically state that the items noted would not lead to serious problems at a later date - he, understandably, refused to make any such promise and I used his response to pull out of the transaction.
 
maby said:
Whoever you use, make sure he (or she) is prepared to come up with definitive statements, not value judgements. The last time we used a surveyor, he came back with a report that identified several things that he was unhappy about but said "I don't think these are likely to be a problem" - As I pointed out to him, this was just about the worst thing he could have done - he got me worried about possible problems but gave me neither the ammunition to pull out of the transaction or sue him on his professional liability insurance if the items identified did prove to be serious problems at a later date. I ended up writing him a letter asking that he should categorically state that the items noted would not lead to serious problems at a later date - he, understandably, refused to make any such promise and I used his response to pull out of the transaction.
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The problem is that because of what you've just said you would do or have done, you will find there are less and less surveyors (and for that matter all areas of business where a professional OPINION is required) who will give a definitive answer if there is any doubt, because of (as you demonstrate) the likelihood of being sued.

You have to understand that you are paying someone to inspect a boat in this case for faults, faults that you might not spot or know where to look or issues that will more than likely lead to faults later and these rightly so will be reported and if they are wrong then fine, you have a case for negligence. However where there is some question as to how an issue might or might not develop in months or years to come it is fully understandable that the surveyor will be reluctant to commit by trying to predict the future, so having given you the best advice he can, will leave the final decision to you, it's up to you...it's your decision.

Suing is for negligent behaviour, not for an incorrect but professional opinion taking into account all relevant information available at the time.
 
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tugger said:
The problem is that because of what you've just said you would do or have done, you will find there are less and less surveyors (and for that matter all areas of business where a professional OPINION is required) who will give a definitive answer if there is any doubt, because of (as you demonstrate) the likelihood of being sued.

You have to understand that you are paying someone to inspect a boat in this case for faults, faults that you might not spot or know where to look or issues that will more than likely lead to faults later and these rightly so will be reported and if they are wrong then fine, you have a case for negligence. However where there is some question as to how an issue might or might not develop in months or years to come it is fully understandable that the surveyor will be reluctant to commit by trying to predict the future, so having given you the best advice he can, will leave the final decision to you, it's up to you...it's your decision.

Suing is for negligent behaviour, not for an incorrect but professional opinion taking into account all relevant information available at the time.
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I would have been very happy for him to say "don't buy it" - and, in fact, pushed him into a position where he did so. The way he phrased it left me in the worst possible position - he had discovered issues that were sufficiently significant for him to have felt the need to report them, but phrased them in such a way that the seller was able to get annoyed with me for wanting to pull out of the transaction. By all means give me a verbal report that in effect says "I don't think this is going to be a problem" but give me a written report that says "be very careful, this could be a very serious problem" - the report comes to me and I'm at liberty to ignore it. Just don't say in effect " I don't like the look of this, but on balance, I think it is probably going to be ok..." - that made it difficult for me to get my deposit back but also would have made it difficult to sue him if it had gone horribly wrong!
 
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