The Register of Local Land Charges

It is a statutory requirement that all Local Authorities within England and Wales compile, maintain and regularly update their Local Land Charges Register.

About the Register

The Register consists of matters of outstanding liability for road and other financial charges, home improvement grants, tree preservation orders and other notices of restriction or prohibition on a parcel of land, either to secure the payment of a sum of money or to limit the use of the said property.

The Local Land Charges Section carries out all official searches covered by the Local Land Charges Act 1975, guaranteeing complete and comprehensive replies by the Council to the Official Certificate of Search (LLC1) and CON 29 enquiries.

A Local Land Charges search is required to ensure that a purchaser of land is not caught out by the existence of obligations or 'charges', enforceable against successive owners by local authorities, or central government.

The word 'charge' is not defined by statute, but is used to describe a burden imposed on land, the most important factor being that the charge must be binding on successive owners or occupiers of land and/or property. The charges detailed on the Local Land Charges Register would not normally be disclosed by looking at the title deeds or indeed by an inspection of the land or property itself. Local Land Charges may be of financial or non-financial nature.

This service is not to be confused with Her Majesty’s Land Registry. If your enquiry relates to ownership of land you should direct yourself to the Land Registry as below:

Trafalgar House 1 Bedford Park Croydon CR0 2AQ

Tel: 03000060411

The Solicitor Regulation Authority, which regulates solicitors, encourages the use of official searches and considers that alternative personal searches of the statutory register, disclosing only limited information, should be undertaken only with the approval of the client when time does not permit official searches. Members of the public are advised to confirm with their solicitors that an official search has been undertaken and to inspect the Official Certificate of Search (LLC1) and CON 29 enquiries to ensure that they have both been carried out to their satisfaction.

A local search consists of two parts:

1. Restrictions on the property which are binding on successive owners: eg. Financial Charges, Tree Preservation Orders and Enforcement Notices.
2. Replies to enquiries on a nationally agreed form giving information of a more general nature: eg. highway proposals, planning history and other planning related matters and outstanding notices.

All this information is supplied to the Local Land Charges Service by other Council Departments, the Government and outside bodies eg. Water Companies.

Turnaround times and processing of searches

• During the period of 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2018, 99.85% of standard searches were carried out in 10 working days and 79.46% in five working days.
• The average turnaround time for searches for this period was 4.15 days and a total of 2604 official search requests were processed.