Location intelligence

Ground Risk Screening API

Screen free coal-mining layers, the BGS National Landslide Database Index and BGS 1:50,000 geological context.

Endpoint

GET/api/v1/property/ground-risk

Provide postcode, or both latitude and longitude.

Geographic availability

Coverage by UK nation

Green: supported Amber: partial Red: not supported

The colour is a geographic coverage indicator, not a risk score. Always inspect source status and completeness in the API response.

England

Supported

Mining Remediation Authority coal layers and BGS landslide/geology context are configured.

Wales

Supported

Mining Remediation Authority coal layers and BGS landslide/geology context are configured.

Scotland

Supported

Great Britain coal and BGS services are queried where their source records provide coverage.

Northern Ireland

Not supported

Northern Irish mining and geological sources are not configured.

Cost per successful request

Pricing

A successful request costs 5 credits and checks coal-mining, recorded-landslide and geological context.

API credits: 5 credits
Rejected or failed: No charge

What the API provides

Coal reporting and planning context

Identifies matches against the published reporting area, coal resources, surface mining and development high-risk layers.

Specific coal-risk layers

Screens published layers for outcrops, probable or past shallow workings, fissures, mine-entry influence zones and mine entries.

Recorded landslides nearby

Returns public BGS landslide-index records inside the requested radius, sorted by calculated distance.

Geological context

Returns selected BGS 1:50,000 descriptions. Artificial ground, mass movement or linear features can create a review prompt, but ordinary bedrock or superficial mapping does not.

Deterministic severity

Specific coal layers or a landslide within 50 metres produce high severity. Broader coal context or other nearby landslides produce medium severity.

Response guide

Field	Meaning
data.complete	True only when both mining WMS requests, the BGS landslide request and the BGS geology request succeeded.
data.location	Resolved property location and recorded-landslide search radius.
data.riskLevel	Highest normalised ground risk level.
data.coalMining.reportingArea	True when the point matches the published coal mining reporting-area layer.
data.coalMining.developmentHighRiskArea	True when the point matches the published development high-risk-area layer.
data.coalMining.matchedLayers	Plain-English names of matched coal-mining layers.
data.landslides	Status, count and concise records with name, locality, year and distance.
data.geology	Status, risk level and concise BGS geological descriptions.

Useful request variants

Use a wider recorded-landslide radius

curl -X GET "https://propertyinsights.co.uk/api/v1/property/ground-risk?postcode=ZZ1%201ZZ&radiusMetres=1000" \
  -H "x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY"

Not included

The result is not an official CON29M report and has no report insurance or professional opinion.
Non-coal mining, brine, quarrying, infilled land and licensed GeoSure natural ground hazards are not included. Free geology context is not GeoSure.
The BGS index records known landslides. No match does not prove stable ground.
Northern Ireland is not covered by this endpoint.

Billing details in the response

Successful chargeable JSON responses include a top-level billing object. The endpoint examples on this page focus on the endpoint-specific data, so this repeated block may not be shown in every example.

"billing": {
  "mode": "prepaid",
  "creditsCharged": 1,
  "creditsRemaining": 1999,
  "creditsRefreshAt": "2026-08-14T09:30:00.000Z"
}

Field or header	Meaning
billing.creditsCharged X-Credits-Charged	Credits charged by this call. Failed and non-chargeable calls return `0` in the header.
billing.creditsRemaining X-Credits-Remaining	The credit balance after the call.
billing.creditsRefreshAt X-Credits-Refresh-At	The next monthly credit refresh as an ISO 8601 timestamp. Trial and non-renewing balances return `null` and omit the header.

All authenticated API-key calls expose the billing headers, including validation errors and zero-credit status or management requests. Only successful chargeable JSON responses add the billing object to the response body.

Parameters

Name	Required	Type	Description
postcode	No	string	Full Great Britain postcode. Alternatively provide coordinates.
latitude	No	number	Latitude when postcode is omitted.
longitude	No	number	Longitude when postcode is omitted.
radiusMetres	No	integer	Recorded-landslide search radius from 25 to 2,000 metres. Defaults to 250.

Source and coverage

Source: Mining Remediation Authority and British Geological Survey
Coverage: Great Britain where the source datasets contain records

A match is a prompt for further enquiry, not a ground stability conclusion. An empty result does not rule out mining or other ground hazards.

Example request

curl -X GET "https://propertyinsights.co.uk/api/v1/property/ground-risk?postcode=ZZ1%201ZZ&radiusMetres=250" \
  -H "x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY"

Example response

{
  "success": true,
  "data": {
    "location": {
      "postcode": "ZZ1 1ZZ",
      "country": "england",
      "latitude": 53.381,
      "longitude": -1.47,
      "radiusMetres": 250
    },
    "coverage": "great-britain",
    "complete": true,
    "riskLevel": "medium",
    "coalMining": {
      "status": "matched",
      "riskLevel": "medium",
      "reportingArea": true,
      "developmentHighRiskArea": false,
      "matchedLayers": [
        "Coal mining reporting area"
      ]
    },
    "landslides": {
      "status": "clear",
      "count": 0,
      "records": []
    },
    "geology": {
      "status": "clear",
      "riskLevel": "none",
      "features": [
        {
          "label": "Bedrock geology",
          "description": "Fictional Formation"
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

OpenAPI specification

Authentication, parameters, billing headers and response schemas are also published in the machine-readable OpenAPI documents in JSON and YAML.