FCI Launches New Look Residential Reports

1st July 2021 – Future Climate Info (FCI) has launched a new, refreshed Residential environmental report range that is available to the conveyancing market from 1st July 2021. The reports have an improved fresh, modern look and feel, providing greater clarity, usability and speed of report analysis.

FCI Essential, FCI Standard, FCI Premium and FCI Premium Plus Planning reports will feature the new look, whilst retaining a robust risk assessment across all data, and supporting conveyancers with Law Society compliance and due diligence.

Some of the key features include:

• Overall Professional Opinion – provided on the front page for improved usability, enabling conveyancers to quickly ascertain what, if any, next steps are required in relation to the key risks.
• Key Risks section – for fast identification of the core due diligence requirements, Environmental and Flood risk results are presented first and foremost, for ease of reviewing the requirements of the Law Society Flood Risk and Contaminated Land Practice Notes.
• Other Considerations – Ground Stability, Energy and Infrastructure, and Planning are presented separately and following the Key Risks.
• Risk Icons – provide clear signposting on the front page, helping to differentiate between each of the risks.
• Result Icons – for Pass, Identified and Further Action provide a fast review of the results.
• Considerations and Next Steps – where a Consideration or Next Step is highlighted, helpful details including the corresponding section number are provided, making it easy to navigate to the item of interest.

Robust Ground Stability Assessment

Alongside the refreshed report design, conveyancers and their clients will also benefit from an improved Ground Stability module, with the inclusion of the British Geological Survey’s (BGS) Property Subsidence Assessment (PSA), also from 1st July 2021.

Included within each of the combined environmental search reports, as well as the standalone FCI Ground Stability reports, the new BGS PSA dataset offers an advanced property-specific assessment of shrink-swell subsidence risk, considering features such as soil type, proximity of trees, the age of the property and the depth of its foundations to provide an assessment of shrink-swell subsidence risk, specific to the property in question.

The collective changes mean that conveyancers and their clients will benefit from a more professional, user friendly report presentation, complete with a more robust Ground Stability module, incorporating the latest intelligent datasets. Alongside this, FCI searches provide an expert professional opinion across the entire report and come backed by independent regulation, with the added peace of mind of excellent customer service and consultancy services from FCI’s in-house Risk Team.

Tim Champney, Managing Director FCI explains: “Buying a house is an exciting but often stressful and daunting time for many home buyers and as a conveyancer you want to ensure the process is as smooth as possible and deliver the best due diligence for your clients. The property boom has placed greater pressure on the sector, making it even more important to access quality reports that provide ease of use and speed of report analysis.

We are committed to providing in-depth environmental search reports with all the relevant information up-front which make the home buying process as simple as possible whilst delivering everything needed for buyers to make the best-informed decision. The introduction of clear symbols and refreshed layout improves usability, making it easier to recognise key risks and next steps or actions that may be needed.”

For further information about the new FCI Residential report range please contact the FCI Risk Team on 01732 755180 or info@futureclimateinfo.com.