Simon Shaw was a surveyor who was hired by James Cunningham in an attempt to remortgage 1 Coronation Street from under the Barlows in July 2011. Grandfather Ken had only recently began forging relationships with his newfound family members and given houseroom to James prior to him starting a job in a homeless hostel in Weatherfield, and was oblivious to the fact that James was in fact, a con artist.
Having made prior arrangements for Ken, Deirdre, Tracy and Amy to be out of the house, the surveyor eventually turned up at No.1 running late for the appointment and was initially surprised when Mr Barlow wasn't at the property in person. James explained that Mr Barlow was his grandad who'd instructed him to show Shaw around and ignored the hint that he was in need of a drink - having been at the last appointment for over three hours dealing with dry rot. James was disinterested in Shaw's work and tried to establish how long it would take for the money to come through. The surveyor pointed out that he didn't have anything to do with the financial side of things, but providing he didn't find anything untoward, it would take somewhere in the region of one to two weeks before "grandad had a nice pocketful of cash".
The surveyor proceeded to go through the house room by room, following a tick-sheet on his clipboard, when he and James were interrupted by Steve McDonald knocking on the door to bring Amy back as he had to cover the switch at Street Cars. Amy was full of questions for James, who explained that Shaw was a "secret friend" and she hadn't to tell anyone that he'd been at the house. Shaw eventually left having completed the survey, being almost shoved out of the front door - with another hint of needing refreshment ignored, but James was more concerned at this point that Amy would spill the beans to Ken and Tracy that a surveyor had been looking round the house.