Inside Land Registry

Land Charges and Agricultural Credits

The Land Charges Department operates under the authority of the Land Charges Act 1972. The Department maintains registers of Land Charges, pending actions, writs and orders affecting land and other encumbrances registered against the names of owners of property which is not registered under the Land Registration Acts.

Agricultural Credits is responsible for maintaining a register of short-term loans by banks under Part ll of the Agricultural Credits Act 1928. These charges are secured on farming stock and other agricultural assets of the farmer.

This year the Land Charges and Agricultural Credits Departments dealt with 5,895,686 applications (up 10.7%), due in the main to a continuing increase in the number of insolvency search applications.

Search and office copy applications made by telephone, direct access and fax increased to 60% of the yearly total (up from 53.8%), with 78% of office copy applications being delivered in this way. Telephone searches, as a proportion of total search applications received, increased to 59% (up from 43.5%).

A small pilot of the new online Land Charges Searches facility is being run through Land Registry Direct. One company has been successfully lodging approximately 12 such searches per day. More users will pilot it soon.