Architect won’t sign Completion Notice Form

[Oceanjules]

Hi,

 

I'm wondering if someone could give me an advice. I had just an extension done and in the process of completion. Now, there are four people that need to sign it- client, builder and 2 planners (I believe it’s the architect and the engineer). I have contacted the architect saying that he won’t sign it as he wasn’t part of the building process. He originally wanted to be part of it from the beginning like overseeing it but of course with the price so I decided not to involve him. He said he would only sign it if he does some checking and of course comes with the fee. 
 

what is my stand on this one please? 
 

thanks 

Edited September 18 by Oceanjules

[bmj1]

This is pretty standard. If you haven't retained the Architect through Stages 5 + 6, and he hasn't supervised the build, then you can't expect him to sign a document and put his PII on the line.

[Oceanjules]

Does that mean it won’t get signed off?

[nod]

You only need building control to sign it off 

You don’t need your builder to do anything 

You certainly don’t need your Architect to sign it off 

Speak to building control 

[Oceanjules]

Ok, thank you. 

[ETC]

2 hours ago, bmj1 said:

This is pretty standard. If you haven't retained the Architect through Stages 5 + 6, and he hasn't supervised the build, then you can't expect him to sign a document and put his PII on the line.

Architect’s don’t supervise. They inspect. Builder’s supervise. Just saying.

[ETC]

……and in any case why do you need the works “signed off”.

 

BC will give you a Completion Certificate once completed……is that not sufficient?

[Oceanjules]

It’s just because I thought the BC won’t sign it off if the architect won’t sign it. 

[Temp]

 Only the BCO signed our completion certificate.

[-rick-]

Isn't this to do with the new changes related to building safety where you need the Principle Designer to sign off on the design and the Principal Contractor to sign off that the building has been built to the design?

 

In which case it shouldn't matter that the architect wasn't involved beyond the design stage?

 

As others have said they have recently got sign off without this but it may depend on when construction started? Not sure of the date off hand but vaguely recall late 2024.

Edited September 19 by -rick-

[Redbeard]

Did your planning (note small 'p') include designating duty-holders under the Bldg Regs and Building Safety Act? There should have, AFAIK, been a Principal Designer at the outset and if, at any stage that person withdrew, there should be a trail stating to whom the PD role has been passed. That ('legacy') person is the one to sign off, and the person taking that role has to be able to prove that they have the required experience and competences.

[-rick-]

12 minutes ago, Redbeard said:

Did your planning (note small 'p') include designating duty-holders under the Bldg Regs and Building Safety Act? There should have, AFAIK, been a Principal Designer at the outset and if, at any stage that person withdrew, there should be a trail stating to whom the PD role has been passed. That ('legacy') person is the one to sign off, and the person taking that role has to be able to prove that they have the required experience and competences.

 

I was under the impression that for low risk buildings the Principal Designer role was only about the design phase, not build phase. I quickly googled and this came up which seems to confirm but I may be missing something:

 

https://www.ribaj.com/intelligence/navigating-the-role-of-principal-designer-building-safety-act

 

From that article it suggests that I was wrong to say 2024 above, in which case I'm not sure how I square it with others here saying they didn't need these details on recent projects.

[DevilDamo]

Are you referring to the decelerations that the client, designer and contractor need to sign as part of the Dutyholders requirements?

[Gus Potter]

4 hours ago, -rick- said:

I was under the impression that for low risk buildings the Principal Designer role was only about the design phase, not build phase. I quickly googled and this came up which seems to confirm but I may be missing something:

Some approximate general comment, I don't touch on all the facets only some, but try and write in the context of self build.

 

 

The CDM 2015 regs tried to reduce the amount and severity of accidents on site. I remember in the early days before 2015 CDM folk were saying to designers.. look you can't do your "Concept design" and bury your head in the sand. You must now introduce the concept of safety to your Clients pretty much at stage Zero. It was good practice as if a Client gives you a funny look at this stage it does not bode well for fee generation.  The reason for this was to encourage Clients to set aside an element in their budget for health and safety on site and enough to cover the professional design fees / early engagement with Contractors and so on to enable this. A common figure that was suggested at the time was 3 -5% of the budget. 

 

Now that kind of worked ok to drive down the number of site accidents as the CDM 2015 caught in the net some of the smaller Contractors who were winging it. Architects got used to it and folk became a bit more responsible, not much but it helped.. there is still a way to go but the CDM 2015 did reduce the accident rate on site. 

 

Grenfell tragedy changed things a lot in England BC and in the UK in general. In Scotland we have a slightly different and nuanced set of building regulations, but these were still open to abuse after 2015. In Scotland when you apply for a completion certificate you have to sign it to say that what you have designed and what you have built is compliant with the building regs, you need to sign off on that. But the BC regs were open to abuse by corporate interests not least.

 

OK to stop this becoming tooo lengthy.. the CDM 2015 got you to the place (with a fair wind) where you built something where no one got hurt during the build. But now after Grenfell folk as asking designers.. now that the building is occupied is your design safe! It's a fair, reasonable and moral question. This could be in terms of structural safety, fire and seviceability for example? 

 

What this means to me is that when I design something as a lead designer I carry the can. I'm responsible for ensuring that if for example a sub designer submits a glass design package I am experienced enough to say.. that looks ok. If an Architect or TF manufacturer submits a design the same applies. If I am not experienced enough ( happens from time to time)  in a particular field then I must alert the Client to my lack of experience and make recommendations.

 

In summary the lead "New Principle Designer" is now responsible for ensuring the future performance of the building to a greater extent in terms of design, safety and seviceability than before. They are not responsible for the quality of work on site in terms of "supervision ~= a traditional clerk of works function). @ETC has posted about this. 

 

But on the other hand Designers are responsible now for not designing something that is so difficult to built it introduces a safety risk in the short and in long term, once the building is occupied. Personally I think this is a good thing as you should be held accountable for what you design. 

 

Here is an example of how I'm navigating, in a pratical way, the change in regs for self builders. I have a number on my books all over the UK but one in particular is a great example. Their design is complex with different materials that behave in very different ways and this extends below the ground with the associated geotechcal and ground water excitement. 

 

The Client is the Principle Designer and we have this recognised in writing. I'm in principle the lead SE and have a level of checking control, but also part of my "tacit role" is to support the Client ( self builder) in fulfilling their responsibility, call that hand holding for which I get paid for. The Client can point to the chain of communication and say.. I have made a big effort to fulfill my Principle Designer Duty as a self builder. With my SE hat on I design the bits and coodinate the interfaces, often connections that the work package suppliers don't want to design. Now this role I perform comes at an extra cost to the Client. But what I try and do is mitigate that by saying see if we knock a few heads together you might even make my fee cost nueutral! 

 

In self building and I see this all the time.. work packages are procured but no one designs an coodinates the interfaces, calls out the Architect, Contractors go off and do their own thing, you as Clients start to "fall in love" with your builder and take their advice without question, it's not uncommon to see fore protection getting changed and so on. 

 

As a point of note.. I have had some recent dealings with Protek, the warranty provider and, they are asking some deep questions about this design liability in terms of the new "Principle Designer Role". My own PI insurance is coming up for renewal soon so no doubt there will be another page of questions about what I'm up to! 

 

In summary I don't think this is insumountable if self builders are willing to adapt and start ot think about keeping a professional on board during the build to hold their hand. 

 

And here lies the fundamental issue!

 

Self building is often traditionally about getting prices for work packages; the founds, timber frame, roof, and so on and you sort the bits out in between. In the old days you could still make a tidy profit by doing it this way as a novice sefl builder.

 

My own gut feeling is that I can see how self builders are finding it more and more difficult and costly to navigate Planning, BC and now the Principle Designer stuff.  

 

From my end I think.. ok this "Principle Designer Role" is not scary provided your Client is willing to pay a bit more. In return I think.. now I have more to contribute to the project and I can chip in more and mitigate my "principle Designer fee". Every cloud often has a silver lining for everyone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Shalford Copse]

@Gus Potter, thank you for this detailed post. I am curious about the agreement that your client was/is the PD. On my self-build, I am operating in that capacity, in the sense that I am coordinating, reading relevant Approved Documents, and asking the architects when I am not sure of something or for them to confirm my understanding. They (the architects) sometimes confer with our BCO.

 

When the architects asked the BCO if they would be willing to accept me as the PD, they would not, because of the competency requirement. I don't have any training, just curiosity, research skills and determination. Have you found an argument for 'client as PD' that somehow passes/bypasses the competency requirement?

[Oz07]

Is the game up with these new regs and this principle designer lark with self build? It certainly sounds like it to me. Too many office wallahs trying to impede the process. I mean we're building houses its not rocket science. No wonder the industry is on its arse.

[Gus Potter]

22 hours ago, Shalford Copse said:

I am curious about the agreement that your client was/is the PD. On my self-build, I am operating in that capacity, in the sense that I am coordinating, reading relevant Approved Documents, and asking the architects when I am not sure of something or for them to confirm my understanding. They (the architects) sometimes confer with our BCO.

 

When the architects asked the BCO if they would be willing to accept me as the PD, they would not, because of the competency requirement. I don't have any training, just curiosity, research skills and determination. Have you found an argument for 'client as PD' that somehow passes/bypasses the competency requirement?

Hiya. 

 

Your curiosity is a challenge! Will try my best to answer. The following is lengthy but I try and put forward the basics of my views. They don't apply to all so do your own research. Good to see you are doing a self build.

 

The following is also a bit general. I don't want to identify my Clients for obvious reasons so need to be a bit vague at times. Hope the following helps build your confidence, gives you some pointers about the questions to ask. I'll start with a broad summary to pick up on my last post. Please excuse my spelling and grammer as I'm off duty so to speak. 

 

1/ We had the 2015 CDM regulations. One element was that designers had to put in place a pre construction phase and construction phase plan. The intention was to help prevent designers designing stuff that could not be safely built and to stop Contractors putting safety to the back of the queue. 

 

Grenfell happened. Now some of the dirty laundry is coming out in the public wash, but there is a lot more to come!

 

Basically this is leading to a recognition that many folk lost their moral compass (some never had one and some will never have, thus the need for more stringent regulation that also captures the self build market) and that designers were just designing in isolation, like the work packages many folk go for on BH. The game is changing and I can see that fabricators / manufactures's are recognising the new business world.

 

This is driven mostly by commercial / competetive market raw boots on the ground stuff.

 

The key here is that the additional regs are partly intended to stop folk designing in isolation and to stop Clients changing the design as they go after they have got their BC approvals. There are quite a few on BH and in general who get their Architect to do their bit, the SE to do their bit, get the approvals and then go off and do their own thing. So what you end up with is a potantially and unsafe structure.

 

So what is an unsafe structure? Well we know it should not fall down, most say, well that is the SE's job! But a structure also has to last say at least 60 years. If the detailing is bad then water ingress / condensation can happen / drains can fail for example and that can lead to an unsafe structure. What is now happening is that BC are starting to say.. we are interpreting the new PD rules in terms of the BC regulations that cover water ingress / condensation etc, so we have skin in the game long term. They then point to the new PD regs and some BC may say, hey you need to appoint a PD!

 

I'm now going to give two examples of a couple of jobs on my books. The first is a job in Scotland. The second is a job in England. We can compare and contrast. 

 

Scotland job Client 1 - Low rise self build in Scotland :

 

Key BC points.

 

1/ In Scotland there is no private BC. The BC function rests with the local authority and the bible is the Scottish Building Standards. 

2/ Contrary to popular belief you don't need an SER registered Engineer to get a building warrant in Scotland. I'm not a member of the SER scheme, some of my work is in England. It sometimes takes a little longer to get a warrant in Scotland if not a SER member, but often the warrant process is driven by water / sewage / other agencies chipping in and the BC officer going off sick or on holiday. 

 

Client 1 got someone to do their plans (not a Chartered Architect and not insured, a mate, at mates rates who did a good job). Got their SE design accepted and the warrant was issued. In other words in Scotland you can do your own plans, detailing and the Structural calculations yourself! But BC will look at all of this in detail. Their in house Engineer will check your SE calcs in the larger councils, the BC officer who is often a Chartered member of the CIOB will check the rest of the design. Funnily, when I submit SE calculations the smaller councils send my calculations to be checked by and external SER Engineer as they can't afford an Engineer of their own. 

 

3/ Scottish BC did not stipulate a PD as a condition of the warrant. 

 

However. The Client had started the work and was seeking a back dated warranty from ProteK. ProteK initially insisted that the Client had a PD. What they roughly wanted,to start with, was someone who would sign their life away to say the everything was perfect and would be in the future. This has nothing to do with PD rules and everthing to do with limiting their liability. After clarification and some comment from my self asking what they were actually insuring, they gave in and removed the PD condition for an admin fee (from memory) of £150.00. 

 

Summary. Scottish BC in this case did not stiputlate that the Client appoint a PD. Thus we need to ask, why are English BC asking for this? 

 

England job Client 2: Low rise but with basement etc . More complex project.

 

This Client has private BC. The Client is MSC qualified (a Masters in a science subject) with extensive life experience, widley read, atriculate, challenges designs and thoughtful. Their private BC has as I understand said that they can be PD.

22 hours ago, Shalford Copse said:

I don't have any training, just curiosity, research skills and determination

There you go! I'll summarise this nextish. 

 

The new PD requirements a rough summary:

 

The way I see it is this. You have high risk buildings (HRB's), fire risk mostly is a hot topic. These could be blocks of flats / high rise, so you do need to have extra training to be a PD on these projects.

 

But to be sensible to apply this to a large basement under a London house that could destabalise a multi story building next door. .. we need to think up as well as down. We could have a house close to landfill ( real potential for ground gas / chemical contamination ), hanging over the edge of a quarry. So the new PD regs also capture this kind of stuff. In this case a PD would be advisable. 

 

However they also are trying to stop folk going off and doing their own thing on site. There are many examples of folk on BH that have stepped off piste on advice from the Builder and later regret! The shit hits the fan, BC get involved and so on. 

 

The new PD regs are intended to capture this and are trying to stop folk avoiding responsibility, but also to encourage people to think holistically about the design, execution, long term seviceabilty and safety.

 

22 hours ago, Shalford Copse said:

and asking the architects when I am not sure of something or for them to confirm my understanding.

This is the key!

 

CDM, PD is about having enough knowledge and common sense to know when to seek professional advice. You are clearly saying you are in regular contact with your Architect, that's what PD's do! It seems to me that if you have got the where withall to write the way you do on BH then your not 14 years old!

 

22 hours ago, Shalford Copse said:

I don't have any training, just curiosity, research skills and determination.

And it comes back to this. You are clearly not stupid!

 

It might be worthwhile putting your Architect on a formal retaining fee, call it a watching brief. Confirm to BC  that you are following the approved design religiously and that you are keeping photographic evidence. Define the procedure if you encounter the unexpected on site, how you will manage any changes on site. i.e.. you call the Architect / SE. At the end of the day your Architect and SE has an approved design. Your Contractor is responsible for the CDM 2015 safety and drawing compliance. 

 

Ask BC why they think you are not competant to recognise if you have changed the design! and, ask them to define the competancy requirements for a low risk building. Well maybe not in the first letter, just say how you are going to manage the PD and list the professionals you have retained. That may be enough to get you over this hurdle. But that said! you need to deliver what you say you are going to do!

 

This is what I do from time to time on a self build. The Client is the PD but I hold their hand / provide advice, a friendly ear, sometimes tough love, for a fee of course. But at the end of the day the fee is not massive as I love seeing stuff I've designed, had a hand in getting built. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by Gus Potter