Under the Law Society Conveyancing Protocol, which statement best describes the handling of additional pre-contract enquiries?

• A. Raise as many generic enquiries as possible.
• B. Raise only specific additional enquiries relevant to the title and issues; indiscriminate use may breach the Protocol; the seller's conveyancer need not deal with all enquiries; opinions rather than facts need not be answered.
• C. Ignore enquiries to avoid delaying the transaction.
• D. Always obtain opinions on every enquiry from the seller's side first.

Answer: (C)

The guiding idea is that pre-contract enquiries should be targeted and relevant, not a blanket flood of questions. Under the Law Society Conveyancing Protocol, you raise only specific additional enquiries that relate to the title and known issues affecting the property. Asking lots of generic, broad inquiries can breach the Protocol by causing unnecessary delay and burden. The seller’s conveyancer isn’t obliged to deal with every question, especially if it goes beyond what’s necessary to understand the title or material conditions of the property. In addition, questions that seek legal opinions rather than factual information aren’t required to be answered; factual clarifications about title, documents, and known matters should be the focus, with any legal opinion sought to be handled separately, if needed, by the purchaser’s own advisors.