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London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
London, 22nd March 2023: New research from leading ConTech solutions providers, Zutec and Createmaster, reveals many UK tenants and leaseholders are living with outstanding maintenance issues in their homes.
From faulty fixtures to unaddressed snagging issues and ongoing defects, the surprisingly high levels of outstanding maintenance issues raised by almost half UK non-freeholders (47%) questioned, indicates many are living in uncomfortable, and potentially unsafe, circumstances.
2,000 residents were polled in January 2023, to understand how safe they felt in their property (only four in 10 tenants surveyed said they feel completely safe in their homes), and the quality of service they received from their asset owner or building maintenance team. This was then compared to an identical survey conducted in autumn 2021 to observe levels of improvement or deterioration against the context of tighter building regulations.
Better communication
Over 40% acknowledged communication and information provision from their asset owner was excellent, a 22% improvement on 2021 levels. No doubt prompted by regulatory changes, this is a step in the right direction. However, 35% said communication was fragmented, inconsistent and lacked detailed information.
Despite this, a higher number of respondents in 2023 felt they had better access to building information than in 2021, particularly around fire safety literature with levels growing from under 10% to around a quarter (+16% increase).
Persistent issues
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said when it came to the quality of maintenance provided. Residents are three-times more likely to have a poorly maintained home than 18-months ago. Furthermore, 63% of respondents felt their issues weren’t addressed promptly after they had raised them.
Almost half of respondents this year (47%) also flagged an existing and unaddressed maintenance issue. Of these, mould and fungus problems were the most common, raised by around two in five (39%), with a similar number flagging broken doors and windows (42%), leaks (36%) or damaged floors, walls and ceilings (36%). Largely unchanged on 2021 levels, it highlights that maintenance delays remain a thorny issue of contention between owner and occupant.
With high-profile coverage of issues such as cladding and fire safety in residential blocks, property owners have been diverting funds to urgent activity such as legally-binding cladding remediation, which may be at the cost of day-to-day repairs. The stagnant results should encourage asset owners to audit their property portfolio, whilst advising residences about how to prevent or treat it.
More work to be done
Commenting on the findings, Maria Hudson, Zutec’s CMO says, “Despite landlords spending out billions on repairs, it’s clear from our research that more needs to be done for tenants to feel safe in their homes. Supply chain issues and skills shortages are an ongoing issue for asset owners.
“However, as the sector faces tougher pressure to meet health and safety measures and new and updated regulatory requirements, such as Building Safety Act 2022, they need to think differently about how they address these issues. A greater understanding of digital tools is needed to galvanise action. The right solutions and technology to develop, collate and then surface the right building information will provide a valuable resource for maintenance, repairs upgrades, retrofits and communication back to tenants, while also supporting their path to compliance and the golden thread of information.”
With solutions across the RIBA stages of an asset’s lifecycle, from design to construction, and handover to maintenance, click to Zutec or Createmaster to understand more about better whole-life asset management.
Starting of the new year with some exciting news!
We are pleased to confirm the addition of Bond Bryan Digital Limited [BBD] to the BuildData Group, alongside the other group brands: Zutec and Createmaster. Bond Bryan Digital are market leaders in the provision of consultancy and advice related to ISO19650 & BIM structured data.
Headed up by Rob Jackson and Emma Hooper, BBD specialise in offering Information Management, Clash Detection and specialist BIM consultancy services to both Clients and Contractors and have established themselves as a leading-edge consultancy in the rapidly expanding UK Digital Construction space by supporting clients to both define & deliver their information requirements.
The addition of the BBD team extends the BuildData ability to provide full digital data support throughout the building life-cycle to all our customers.
Find out more about Bond Bryan Digital Here : https://www.bondbryandigital.co.uk/
New Civil Engineer’s Future of Rail virtual event took place on Thursday 15th July, exploring the post Covid-19 role of the railway, and assessing innovative opportunities in the sector.
Watched by 200 online attendees, sessions covered critical issues such as climate change, the importance of electrifying UK rail, and the true value of digital twins in asset management.
The impressive line-up of speakers included Mike Smith, Programme Director of Restoring Your Railway at Network Rail; Maria Cliff, Head of Operations at East West Rail; Lawrence Shackman, Head of Rail Projects and Technical Services at Transport Scotland; and our own Tom Boland, Head of Digitisation at Zutec.
Tom shared his knowledge of digital twins during the session entitled: World-leading approach to using digital in infrastructure construction.
As Silver Sponsors of the event, Zutec were delighted to host this 15-minute presentation and Q&A session, in the expert company of Peter Ruff, Head of BIM for SCS Railways on the HS2 project, and Dr Anita Soni, Deputy Head of BIM at SCS Railways and Skanska Infrastructure.
This practical session provided a deep-dive into how SCS – the joint venture between Skanska, Costain and STRABAG – is delivering the 250k southern section of the £106bn HS2 railway, by engaging fully with HS2’s big digital ambitions.
Facilitated by the Zutec BIM platform, SCS and HS2 are together connecting the digital model of the southern section between London and Birmingham, with the quality control and inspection documentation. It’s a ground-breaking digital twin project that will benefit stakeholders, from the engineers and suppliers on site, to end users of the completed railway.
The presentation showed how connecting the engineering data and quality documentation with real-time reporting is benefitting the entire project, culminating in the automated and efficient handover of structured data at completion.
The panel enlightened the audience on how higher quality and more accurate inspection and quality control records can be stored in a digital twin, and passed over to the client to maintain the railway during the operational phase.
It was emphasised that ‘making life easier’ is the core objective of this digital twin strategy. With 5 million quality checklists digitised through the Zutec platform, it has been possible to provide multiple stakeholder groups with one source of the truth. Pre-populated forms save time, site inspections are streamlined and audit trails are reliable and transparent. Overall, there are health and safety, time, cost, data security, environmental and quality benefits, from deploying this digital information flow.
Further insights were provided into how the supply chain is given a helping hand with digital twin technology on a project like this. Suppliers have access to the BIM data lake, for example, as well as real time progress and information tracking. Expectations can be tightly managed and suppliers can plan ahead with ease.
Tom, Peter and Anita also touched on ‘getting people on board’ saying that, to date, the system has been successfully rolled out to 550 staff and 48 subcontractors. This will grow to over 1,500 users and 80 companies on the system in 2022. Training, clear communication of the benefits, and empowering site engineers to become the ‘owners’ of elements of the system have all helped embed the project.
The inspection and test plan sign-off process has been reduced from 21 days to 4, the panel revealed, and there has been a 90% reduction in time spent completing forms. All key milestones were met during Covid, confirming how, with the right technology in place, it’s possible to satisfy the customer, even during a pandemic.
Final thoughts to round off the presentation focused on what has underpinned such achievements, and a simple equation was shared: Strategy + People + Platform = Success. Ongoing improvements continue to be seen, the speakers said, as this vast, ambitious infrastructure project powers towards completion.
Fill out the form here to watch the full video now.
To learn more about digital twin technology and how it can be used in infrastructure projects, book a demo with Zutec today.
On Monday 5th July, the long-awaited Building Safety Bill was finally published and simultaneously announced in parliament.
The Bill comes nearly 12 months after the draft Bill was published and 4 years after the Grenfell Tower tragedy, which forced the nation to address its wholly inadequate building and fire safety regimes.
The UK’s Housing Secretary, Robert Jenrick said that the Bill will “reassure the vast majority of residents” and provide “essential oversight at every stage of a building’s lifecycle from design, construction, completion to occupation.”
Those working within AECO (architecture, engineering, construction and operation) will already be familiar with many of the details outlined in the draft Bill. However, it is yet to be clarified exactly how many elements of Dame Judith Hackitt’s review and the resulting Building Safety Bill will be practically implemented.
Tom Boland, our Global Head of Digitalisation said: “Building owners and contractors alike are waiting for clarity around the new regulations and their own obligations, and the industry desperately needs this to accelerate the rebuilding of trust with buyers and tenants.”
What is known for sure is that the Bill will have massive implications for those involved in the development, construction and management of multi-occupancy residences which exceed 18m in height or 7 storeys.
These so called HRRBs (High Risk Residential Buildings) have been placed under necessary scrutiny in recent years, with a £5bn fund created as part of the Building Safety Programme to support vital remediation work, including the removal of dangerous cladding.
Despite the existence of the fund, many residents are still facing hefty bills for repairs and renovations. Moreover, there has been a spate of reports about leaseholders in HRRBs who are unable to value, remortgage or sell their properties due to difficulties in obtaining the necessary safety certificates, known as ESW1s.
Perhaps in response to this situation, the publication of the Bill makes it clear that the time scale in which a leaseholder can sue a developer for repairs has more than doubled from 6 years, to 15. This development (made possible through an amendment to the existing Defective Premises Act 1972) is what has been grabbing most of the headlines this week.
However, the implications of the Bill for developers and asset owners go much further:
Gateway one comes into effect from the 1st August 2021. It affects pre-planning and will require developers to include fire statements in their applications, as well as considering things like emergency access and water supplies for firefighting.
The wheels are already in motion for the Building Safety Bill and as more of the new legislation is passed, the responsibilities faced by stakeholders are going to become more and more significant. Asset Lifecycle Information Management, communication and transparency will become more vital to compliance than ever and Tom Boland says digital tools have a key role to play in facilitating those things.
“Now is the time for any companies without a digital plan to put one in place,” he says.
Find out how Zutec can support your organisation with our Asset Lifecyle Information Management systems. Request a Demo.