Guidance

HM Land Registry portal: official search of whole with priority

How Business e-services customers can apply for an official search of whole with priority through the portal.

• From: HM Land Registry
• Published: 19 October 2015

Applies to England and Wales

An official search of whole with priority is used to protect a transaction for value that affects the whole of the land in a registered title, eg a purchase, a lease or a charge.

The search prevents registration of an adverse interest for 30 business days (the priority period) to allow the applicant to lodge the protected application. The search result will tell you:

• any alterations made to the register since the search from date
• any pending applications, existing official searches with priority or outline applications which provide short term priority for classes of transaction that are not capable of protection by official search

Start an official search of whole

Log in to the portal.

Select ‘Information Services’ then ‘Official Search of Whole with Priority’.

1. Enter the ‘Title number’ of the property.
2. Enter the name of the ‘Registered proprietors’ of the title. If the registered proprietors are private individuals, you only need to enter the surname of one of the proprietors.
3. Select ‘Next’ to continue.

Enter search details

1. Use the drop down menus to select a ‘Search from date’. This date should be taken from a recent official copy of the register or register view. If the title number is a pending first registration and the system does not recognise the details, you can still lodge the OS1 application by continuing with the ‘No name match’ option.
2. Enter the ‘Customer reference’.
3. Enter the ‘Applicant’s full name’ (maximum of 100 characters). The name entered here is printed on the search result, so it’s important that they’re spelt correctly. If the protected application is lodged at a later date and the names in the search and the application do not match, the application may not be protected.
4. Choose the ‘Priority type’, eg select ‘Purchase’ to protect a purchase.
5. It is only possible to get immediate results where there are no adverse entries to reveal in the certificate of result and the only applications pending on the day list are earlier searches of whole with priority. In other cases, the application will be processed, but sent electronically later.
6. Fees are charged on submission of your application. Select ‘Submit’ to continue.

Application confirmation

The application confirmation screen will state whether or not the result can be sent immediately.

Application details

The official search certificate shows:

• the official search number (115 – AO – JN)
• the certificate date (16 October 2009) and the time that the priority period begins (14:11:35)
• the date the priority period expires (26 October 2015)
• the title number
• the applicant’s name
• the result of the search – if no adverse entries have been made since the ‘Search from’ date.

See the ‘PDF Downloads’ area to view the result of the search or for the date of despatch by post. You can access PDFs free of charge for 30 days (inclusive) from the day the application was submitted. Read more about how to get PDF downloads.

Start a new search

To start a new application or select another service, select ‘New search’ on the right hand side.

Logout

When you have completed your tasks, select ‘Logout’ at the top of the screen to exit the system securely.

Published 19 October 2015