The Valuation Office established ten, later twelve, individual valuation districts in Scotland which were comprised of a number of income tax divisions, these being considered the most convenient units for administrative purposes. Initial information on ownership, tenants, insurance, ratings (where known) past sales etc. was collated using existing sources and in the return of questionnaire forms from landowners, in particular the 'Form-4 Land'. These return forms were never formally preserved, but may be found within various private archival collections. It was certainly in the owners' interests to record information accurately, as a dubiously low initial value could lead to a much higher increment duty being applied in the future. Once this initial stage was completed, the valuation staff then went into each district to inspect every hereditament, delineate its boundaries on a map, and record its particular values in a field book. Some properties were exempt from increment value duty, but each and every hereditament was recorded where possible, whether exempt or not. The NRS has some records relating to questions and disagreements between a number of landowners and the Inland Revenue (e.g. see GD325/1/163 for comment on the "spirit of hostility" being shown to landowners), but general files relating to the work of the survey are held at The National Archives in London.
For rural areas, hereditaments were grouped together by civil parish or burgh, arranged within applicable pre-1975 county series. For example, a field book entry for a croft in the vicinity of the village of Tayvillach, would be found within the books relating to North Knapdale parish, county of Argyll (National Records of Scotland, IRS54/209-210). Urban areas were arranged by county, and then either by burgh, parish or, most likely, by ward. So, for example, entries for businesses that line George Street in Edinburgh would be found within the field books relating to Ward 11, within the county series for Edinburgh and Leith (IRS65/279-301). It is much easier however to determine which field book to consult by firstly inspecting an IRS map.
