Relationship to Lenders and ensuring surveyors value up to required figures

I am a Chartered Valuation Surveyor who has worked in the London market for the last ten years. I, along with may surveyors have been "banned" from going to certain offices and Foxtons have attempted to create a blanket ban against me working for ANY lender. As many people know, Foxtons have a commercial relationship with Alexander Hall mortgage brokers. I understood that Foxtons owned Alexander Hall but I can find no verification of this on the websites.

If, as an interested purchaser, you register your details with Foxtons your confidential details will be passed to Alexander Hall so that they will approach you with a mortgage offer before any other company does. Alenxander Hall will, if everything goes to plan, arrange the mortgage through one of their "contacts". When the valuation request is sent to the surveyors they will try and make an appointment with Foxtons who are selling the property. The negotiator will take all the surveyor's details including the company he or she works for. This information is passed back to Alexander Hall for "vetting". If they do not like the surveyor chosen they will object to the lender and ask for another surveyor. In most cases their wish will be granted by lenders too eager to do any business with the foxtons group. Some lenders have agreed that certain surveyors will not be apointed to value property sold through Foxtons.

If the Surveyor has been "cleared" to do the valuation by Foxtons he or she will be presented with a "surveyor's pack" on entering the relevant Foxtons office. This "pack" provides details of "similar" properties sold (comparables) by Foxtons in the recent past. Whenever I have checked the "comparables" given, there are invariably discrepancies noted and in many cases the "sales" cannot be verified at all. If the surveyor disagrees with the purchase price, the usual result is that all hell will break loose. Foxtons and Alexander Hall will write, fax and phone the lender telling them that this particular surveyor does not know the "market" and will send details of fabricated sales figures to "justify" their arguments.

Foxtons and Alexander Hall have built up "relationships" with the leading lenders, which, due to the volume of work given in the last few years, has given the Foxtons group some real leverage in the market. Major banks assign consultants specifically to handle Foxtons work. These "relationships" have recently come under the spotlight particularly from the media and these concerns are now being made known to the Financial Services Authority. HOWEVER consistent pressure needs to be exerted on this unwholesome organisation if due process is to prevail and buyers, sellers, renters, landlords and the general public spared the malevolence of this hideous hard sell outfit.