Stakeholder Responsibilities

Introduction

The Building Control Service of Ards and North Down Borough Council plays a crucial regulatory role serving the local construction industry, assisting applicants, designers, and builders in the creation of buildings that are safe, healthy, accessible, and energy efficient.

This document highlights some of the main responsibilities of applicants, designers, and contractors involved in the construction process and sets out what they can expect from the Building Control Service.

Responsibilities of the Applicant

The applicant has the lead role in ensuring the success of the construction project. Their responsibilities include:

Engaging Competent Professionals: The applicant should engage suitably competent designers and contractors.
Timely Application: The applicant must lodge a building control application in good time, before the commencement of work, or ensure that their agent does so.
Notifications of key stages of work: Unless a client has delegated this responsibility to the builder, or someone else who is managing the build on their behalf, they need to give timely notification to building control prior to commencement, and at other key stages, of the work. Please see Inspections - Ards and North Down Borough Council
Supervision of construction: Unless they are taking on this role themselves, the applicant should engage a competent person to supervise the construction process on their behalf. While building control surveyors carry out site inspections, as part of their regulatory role, these limited inspections cannot guarantee that all the statutory requirements set out in building regulations are met and are not intended to replace competent site supervision. It is essential that someone with a good understanding of the client's wishes supervises the work to ensure that client expectations are met and that all regulatory requirements are complied with.
Ensuring work complies with the Building Regulations: This is ultimately the responsibility of the applicant, and where work is found to be in breach of regulations the applicant will need to ensure that any defects are remedied, and the work is brought back into compliance. Where building control becomes aware of work that does not comply with the building regulations, they will endeavour to engage with the person responsible for the work, usually the contractor in first place, with the aim of having any defects or deficiencies addressed. Building control follows a proportionate enforcement regime with the aim of issuing a completion certificate on satisfactory execution of the work. Where serious contraventions are not dealt with appropriately the applicant, as well as the contractor, may be subject to enforcement procedures.

Responsibilities of the Designer

The designer plays a critical role in the construction process. Their responsibilities include:

Professionalism and competency: The designer should only undertake designs to schemes within their range of competency, calling on the expertise of other professionals to assist as required.
Detailed and annotated plans: For Full Plans applications the designer must produce relevantly detailed and annotated plans, that meet the client's needs and clearly demonstrate how the work will comply with the Building Regulations, submitting these for approval prior to commencement of work on site.
Providing design clarification: Particularly where additional information is required by the client, the contractor, or building control to allow the work to be constructed to comply with regulations and client expectations.
Liaison with Building Control Service: The designer should liaise with the Building Control Service, keeping them informed of any proposed changes from the original design and, responding to any queries and making necessary amendments to the plans and submitting them in a timely manner.

Responsibilities of the Contractor

The contractor has the main responsibility for carrying out the construction work professionally and competently. Their responsibilities include:

Compliance with the Building Regulations: The contractor must ensure that the work is carried out in compliance with the Building Regulations, and in accordance with the client's requirements and any other statutory requirements. Where deviations to approved plans are to be carried out, agreement should be sought from the designer, the client, and building control before engaging in such work.
Site safety: The contractor is responsible for maintaining site safety and adhering to health and safety regulations.
Quality of work: The contractor must ensure the quality of work, using suitable materials and workmanship.
Notification of statutory stages: Unless the client, or the designer, has taken on this responsibility the contractor must give adequate notice of key stages of the work to the council to give building control the opportunity to inspect the work as required. Please see Inspections - Ards and North Down Borough Council
Seeking clarification: Where drawings or specification are unclear, or a contractor is unsure of what is required, they should seek instruction from the designer, or the client. Design advice should not be sought from building control. The role of the Building Control service is to assess designs and work presented for approval for compliance with the Building Regulations. Building Control will, on request, give opinions on the interpretation of specific building regulations but should not be asked to offer design proposals.

Responsibilities of the Building Control Service

Designers, customers, and those responsible for carrying out construction work can expect the following from the Building Control Service:

Guidance and Advice: The service provides guidance on interpretation of the Building Regulations, helping designers to ensure that their designs comply with the relevant statutory requirements.
Plan Assessment: The service reviews and assesses submitted plans for compliance with building regulations, issuing approval when the plans are deemed to demonstrate compliance with the relevant regulations or rejecting them if they are deemed to be deficient. Where plans are rejected building control will set out in writing why the plans are not being approved, within a reasonable timescale, giving designers the opportunity to submit amended plans for approval. Plan approval is limited to work controlled under the Building Regulations.
Site Inspections: Building control carry out limited site inspections, at key stages, as part of a regulatory function to help establish that the work is being carried out in accordance with the relevant building regulations. It is the contractor's responsibility to ensure that the work, as constructed, complies with the relevant building regulations.
Dangerous Buildings: Where it comes to the attention of the Building Control service that buildings, adjacent to public roads, or pavements, are potentially dangerous to passers-by, the service will act to make owners aware of their statutory responsibilities to maintain their property to protect public safety. If necessary, they will liaise with others to help ensure that members of the public, on roads or pavements, are protected from such dangers until they are adequately dealt with.
Enforcement: Where it comes to the Building Control Service's attention that building work has been carried out without application, or in contravention of building regulations, or where in scope dangerous buildings are not being made safe, the service will carry out proportionate enforcement in line with recognised best practice. Building control will offer people opportunity to make amends where inadvertent errors have occurred whilst recommending prosecution if wilful or persistent breeches of building regulations are encountered.
Certification: Once the client/ builder has demonstrated, to the council's satisfaction, that the work has been completed to meet the relevant requirements of the Building Regulations, the building control service will issue a completion certificate.

Limitations of Building Control's responsibility

Set out below are some of the limitations and most common misconceptions around what building control is responsible for.

Supervision: Building control site inspections are not intended to provide a construction supervision service. The statutory notifications are there to ensure engagement with the Building Control Service at key stages in the work, to enable inspections to be carried out when deemed appropriate. This allows the contractor to have a building control surveyor visit at key stages of the work and to provide some reassurance that works are progressing satisfactorily. Where work is found to be non-compliant building control will advise the contractor at the earliest opportunity. If suitable remedial action is not undertaken the council will enforce the Building Regulations in line with its enforcement policy.
Providing design advice: This is not a function of the building control service. Architects, designers, and engineers, among others, should be engaged to provide design advice. Care should be taken to appoint designers who have the appropriate experience and competence to undertake the work for which they are being engaged. If insufficient design information has been provided to allow the contractor to carry out the work the designer should be approached for clarification. If the client has not engaged a designer, then they must either take that role on themselves or delegate it to someone else with suitable competence, and experience, to ensure that the design meets the requirements of the relevant building regulations. In certain small domestic schemes, where a Building Notice has been used rather than a Full Plans application, an experienced competent contractor may be able to work with the applicant to design a scheme that meets the client's approval and satisfies the requirements of building regulations.
Issuing instructions: Is not a function of the building control service; its role is to assess proposals for compliance with the Building Regulations. If work is not deemed to be acceptable the designer or the contractor shall come up with suitable remedial proposals for further assessment.
Guarantees: Building Control Passing of Plans, or the issuing of a Completion Certificate, does not provide a guarantee that every detail of the design, or every part of the work undertaken, satisfies all requirements of the Building Regulations or client expectations. It is not building controls responsibility to ensure the client, or designers, specification is meet where it exceeds the minimum standard of the Building Regulations. Designers retain responsibility for the design, and contractors for the work constructed, any issues relating to these matters should be directed to them. With the complexity of designs, and the overload of information often provided, it is impossible to ensure that every note and detail is 100% correct. "Approved" plans are documents that have been assessed by building control and have been deemed adequate to allow work to be carried out that meets the functional requirements of the relevant building regulations.
Dispute Resolution: The resolution of disagreements over design specifications, or conflicts between parties, fall outside building control's remit. If relations breakdown between parties the ultimate responsibility for ensuring that work complies with regulations sits with the applicant. Where stakeholders have disagreements they must seek other avenues for dispute resolution, such as legal mediation, arbitration, or contractual negotiations.

Conclusion

In conclusion, designers, contractors, applicants, and building control all have important roles to play in the construction process. By understanding and fulfilling their responsibilities, they can all play their part to help ensure that buildings are safe, healthy, accessible, and energy efficient.