SC22226 - Professional Land Services

The contract is required to provide access to professional services for the following elements:

Land Compensation Act (LCA) Claim Management

The Consultant is required to carry out the following in providing the claims services

• The Consultant shall undertake the Environmental Assessment required to inform the resolution of the claims. The Client shall provide relevant historic environmental information to inform the production of the Environmental Assessment.
• The Client will receive claims from third parties, check claims and reject them if they are not considered valid e.g. incorrect Relevant Date. The Client will also clarify claims where duplicate claims are received.
• On receipt of the Environmental Assessment, the Client will reject all claims where there is no predicted increase in any of the physical factors.
• The Consultant is required to inspect all the instructed claim properties.
• The Consultant is required to endeavour to reach agreement in a timely fashion with the claimants’ agents or the claimants where unrepresented, on a recommended settlement.
• The Consultant is required to submit a Report & Valuation, on standard Client proforma templates for approval with their recommended agreed settlement for each individual claim along with the agent’s reasonable fee settlement, to the Client and the Client’s Legal Services to carry out legal checks on title and entitlement before the Client makes payment.
• The Client has a policy that reimbursement of claimant’s agent’s reasonable fees should be based on Ryde’s Scale+20%. This is generally accepted by the majority of agents but if not accepted then in exceptional cases, the Client will accept time charge fees, with supporting timesheets. The Consultant will be required to negotiate and agree with the claimant’s agent an appropriate hourly rate commensurate with the level of skill and knowledge required to audit and recommend fee settlement when the claim is agreed.
• If a claim cannot be agreed and the claimant refers the matter to the Lands Tribunal the Consultant will be required to support the Client in the defence of that referral if so required.
• The Consultant is to prepare and update monthly a spreadsheet showing progress of claims, for submission to the Client on first working day of the month including the estimate of the Client’s predicted liability per claim and estimated overall potential liability for the full 6-year claim period (the actual layout is to be agreed with the Client).

Professional Land Services

• Land acquisition – negotiations to purchase land, advice and consultancy services for Compulsory Purchase Orders, voluntary acquisition, blight, assessment of values and compensation
• Land referencing and updates
• General land related advice
• Other land related claims against the council
• Negotiating rights of access over land