This article gives information on local authority hot issues that affect services such as delivery of searches.

Products Affected:

• Official Local Authority Search
• Regulated Local Authority Search

Reason:

• Local Land Charges have informed us of system downtime between Thursday 8th October 2026 to Monday 26th October 2026. Searches submitted after 5pm Wednesday 7th October 2026, will not be accepted until Monday 26th October 2026 and no searches will be returned during the system downtime.
   

Expected Delay:

• Their turnaround time has increased to 40 working days to account for this.

Update 26/10/2026:

• Further to the notification issued on Tuesday 29th September 2026, Local Land Charges have advised that unfortunately their system downtime has been extended until Wednesday 28th October 2026. Searches submitted after 5pm Wednesday 7th October 2026, will not be accepted until Wednesday 28th October 2026 and no searches will be returned during the system downtime.

Update 28/10/2026:

• Further to the notification issued on Tuesday 29th September 2026, Local Land Charges have advised that they are currently carrying out final system checks following their recent system upgrade to ensure all services are functioning correctly. They anticipate that the service will be fully operational from tomorrow. However, we will seek confirmation from Local Land Charges beforehand and provide a further update once this has been received.

Options:

• What we can offer is to provide a search delayed indemnity policy. If you would like to proceed with this option, then please send us the limit of indemnity so we can provide you with an accurate quote. Otherwise, we will keep chasing the Local Authority and have the completed search back with you as soon as possible. 
• Follow this article to be alerted of updates as we receive them