Surveyor let himself into my flat and bedroom while i was sleeping, as agent forgot to tell me apt

faerielight

aw thank you.. I will!!! OMG it will be such a relief  

Sapindus

I can never understand that "I don't bother with doorbells".  How much effort does it take to at least try it if there is one??  Sounds like the surveyor is as much use as the estate agent.

HouseMartin567

@faerielight

Very similar happened to me, although I wasn’t home. I was alerted due to the house alarm going off (showed on my phone) and the EA calling me to turn off the alarm cos the Surveyor was there. I told them if they had bothered to inform me about the survey I would haven’t alarmed the place.

And this Surveyor also didn’t ring the doorbell - I would have been able to tell from my phone if he did. The house alarms going off (via my phone) freaked me out but would have been worse to just have someone walking into my house had I been at home as has happened to you.

I emailed a complaint to the manager - it took them a week to come back with a tepid apology. I agree with getting the keys back, they obviously can’t be trusted to communicate properly.

Flugelhorn

sheramber said:

why did the agent have the keys?

I have never been asked to give an estate agent keys  when selling.

how do they do viewings? I haven't personally showed anyone around my property when selling since the 1990s - it is always the agent and they have the keys 

Flugelhorn

sheramber said:

I have  sold  5 times  and never been asked for keys. 

I last did a viewing in person in the 90s - ever since then, the agent has had the keys and got on with it - 4 sales and the 3 we have bought since then have been agent viewings so they had the keys 

HampshireH

Viewings are a bit different to unannounced and unaccompanied surveyors just wandering around without permission 

faerielight

yes I had no problem with  them using my keys to have an arranged visit to my home, it was waking up to a man in my actual bedroom that was unacceptable. 

whizzywoo

I assume your house is now Sold Subject to Contract so there should be no need for the estate agent to hold the keys for viewings anymore.

Send them an email complaining about the fact that they gave out the keys to a third party without your knowledge and tell them that you are coming in to collect the keys.

A similar thing happened to us although our house was empty as we had moved out.  The agent did not tell us a surveyor was coming to do a valuation.  We found out by accident from a different source.  When challenged the estate agents could not tell us when or to whom they had give the keys to, nor when they had received them back.

Because of their already poor record with us about lying, not putting information in emails, different tales from different people in the office, etc, etc we took the keys back immediately.  That way we could be sure that we would know in advance if any further visits to the house were necessary.

It's your home, you still live there, no more viewings are going to happen, get your keys back.  It won't impact on your sale.

TroubledTarts

Personally I would always check with a shout out at the front door, are you a heavy sleeper?

Simple steps like a door chain would have helped, or a secondary internal only bolt.

Could have been worse.

Section62

Sapindus said:

I can never understand that "I don't bother with doorbells".  How much effort does it take to at least try it if there is one??  Sounds like the surveyor is as much use as the estate agent.

Personally I'd usually ring the bell or shout 'hello' when going into someone else's home if I've been given the keys for access (primarily for my own safety), but I don't think it is unreasonable for the surveyor to expect the house to be empty if they've been told to collect the keys from the EA because there was nobody at the house to let them in.

I doubt the surveyor is impressed with the EA having wasted their time having to collect and then return keys they didn't need, along with putting them in the stressful/embarassing position of finding themselves in an occupied bedroom.

As a minimum the EA should send someone round to return the keys with flowers/chocolates to add to the grovelling apology.