The survey is a morning's work and it is worth knowing what it involves, both if you are the building owner paying for it and if you are the neighbour deciding whether to let somebody into your house. It is not an inspection of your property for defects, it is not a valuation, and it produces no opinion about anybody's building. It is a camera, a notebook and a systematic walk through the rooms nearest the work.
What happens on the visit
The surveyor works room by room on the side of the property nearest the proposed work, then the external elevations facing it. In each room they photograph the walls, ceiling and any existing damage, and write a short factual note against each: where it is, what it is, how big. Doors and windows that already stick get noted, because they are the first thing to move. The whole is dated. A house of eight rooms and two elevations is comfortably a morning including the write up, and the worksheet on this site sizes it from your own figures.
How a party wall schedule of condition is agreed
Where an award is being made, the surveyors agree the schedule between them and attach it. Where the neighbour consented to the notice and no award is needed, the two owners agree it directly: one of them commissions it, both look at it, and both keep a copy with the date. What matters in either case is that the neighbour has seen it and not objected before the work starts, because a schedule the neighbour first sees during a damage argument is worth much less.
What the neighbour is actually agreeing to
Access for an hour or two, and a photographic record of the rooms nearest the work. Nothing about the schedule of condition party wall surveyors produce commits the neighbour to anything else, and it protects them at least as much as it protects the building owner: without it, proving that a crack is new is as hard as proving it is old. Neighbours who understand that usually say yes, and neighbours who were asked badly usually say no.
Questions people ask about schedule of condition survey
Is this the same as a building survey?
No. A building survey reports on a property's condition for somebody buying or maintaining it. This records what exists on a date, as evidence, and takes no view. This site does not deal with homebuyer or building surveys at all.
Can the neighbour refuse access?
They can, and it is their house. Where an award has been made it can provide for access on notice; where consent was given and access is refused, take dated photographs of what you can see from your own side and record the refusal in writing.
How long should the visit take?
Long enough to do every room facing the work properly. The worksheet here works it from your own rooms, elevations and minutes a room rather than from a rule of thumb.