Crownstone Avis 

I paid £354 for a damp report that was delayed, didn’t cover the area I had specified to them and they did not perform actions they had specified they would (eg reviewing roof timbers). It turned out the issue was a roof problem, not the issues they stated. I tried for over 3 weeks to get hold of the surveyor to ask him more details to no avail. I then asked for the survey money back and they turned very nasty. I warned someone on a social media site not to use them (in response to someone mentioning them) and they issued a cease and desist notice and sent me numerous abusive emails stating I had defamed them and had lied. I would avoid like the plague.

I paid £295 plus VAT for a damp survey on a property I am buying with my wife. For that we got, what I consider to be, a very poor quality report. The section on findings/recommendations was a single page long (and very poorly written/difficult to understand). The rest of the report contained some photos that were not labelled, generic information on types of damp and details of a quote. The report contained no information on particulars of the survey such as what measurements had been taken and what areas had been inspected. What's more, the report missed a number of damp areas that a RICS surveyor had found as part of his full building survey. I wanted clarity on all these points but the damp surveyor then ignored my emails and calls for a number of days. He eventually gave me answers to my questions via email and told me it was for me to tell him the areas he should have focused on during the damp survey. This is clearly absurd as he is the damp specialist. I do not recommend using Crownstone as a damp specialist. For £295 plus VAT you get very little.

Further update as of 11 July 2023 - earlier today, nearly three years after Crownstone produced the damp survey (!), someone at Crownstone contacted me to ask for further detail in relation to the review above. Unsurprisingly, given the passage of time, I was not able to provide this detail and I directed the person to the contemporary correspondence I had with the producer of damp surveyor, which contained full details of my complaint. I therefore contest what Crownstone has alleged in their reply to this review (i.e. that I refused to provide any detail to support my review). Very sharp practice by Crownstone.