i need advice on h.i.p. energy report

[jdh1975]

a few months back i decided to put my house up for sale, as i was moving in with my partner, i chose an estate agent and decided to get a h.i.p. pack through them.
I opted to pay for this pack on a deferred basis ( pay for report and deferral fee) when house is sold, they didnt carry out the assessment themselves and subbed it out to a local company, however, due to the current economical situation, i couldnt get a buyer for the house and decided to let my house out through another agent, i contacted the estate agent and gave my 2 weeks notice and asked them to bill me for the hip report and to take down their sign from my property.
i didnt hear back from them so i phoned and was told to got to the office and pay for the hip report, i expected that i was to get a comprehensive folder but the guy at the estate agents said that they dont do that anymore and upon payment he would email me a link to a website so that i could donload the report myself!!!!!
my house is only a 2 bed terraced but after the estate agents had put their fee and a deferral fee on top of the report fee, im facing having to fork out �500!!!! im under the impression that as i took my house off the market with them and therefore didnt sell through them, then i should only pay the company that done the hip report, which would work out considerably less than 500 quid!!
my letting agent tells me that as long as i have a tenent in my house before 1st oct this year, then i dont need a hip report, so at the moment im thinking of just waiting to see if the estate agent chases me up on the payment........any advice anyone??? do i pay?? dont i pay?? do i just try to get the details of the firm that carried out the report and pay them directly??

[buildersmate]

You are going to have to look at the small-print on your contract with the estate agent. What exactly does it say about payment for the HIP report in the event of you withdrawing the house from the sale. Whatever it says is what you are going to have to pay. If it says nothing, you owe them nothing. if it says you will pay the fees incurred in preparing the report, then ask for a details breakdown, but I don't hold out much hope for you reducing this figure because it is extremely easy for a �500 invoice to be produced. Unfortunately the moral of the story is one has to agree up front the exact figure, or at least a cap, or you are likely to get shafted. You could try local Trading Stds, but I don't think they will be able to help - it doesn't sound like an unfair contract term to me. Give us more relevant details about what the contract says, please.

[Eve]

As rgeards HIPs, it's more common now to have them via e.mail ink as it makes them far more tranferable quicker and easier.

If you want to use it again, make sure you have a good copy in case they take the weblink offline.