The building warrant of fitness: what a New Zealand owner signs each year, and how to make it true

01

What a building warrant of fitness is

A building warrant of fitness, usually shortened to BWOF (MBIE writes BWoF), is described by MBIE's building regulator as "a building owner's annual statement confirming the specified systems in the compliance schedule for their building have been maintained and checked for the previous 12 months, in accordance with the compliance schedule" (Building warrants of fitness, MBIE guidance for building officials).

The duty is in section 108 of the Building Act 2004. It applies to any building for which the council has issued a compliance schedule, which in turn is required when a building contains one or more specified systems: sprinklers, fire alarms, emergency lighting, automatic doors, lifts, mechanical ventilation, backflow preventers and the other systems whose failure could put people at risk. MBIE's Compliance Schedule Handbook (Amendment 3, effective 14 February 2014) summarises what section 108 requires of the warrant. It must:

• be supplied on each anniversary of the issue of the compliance schedule;
• state the location of the compliance schedule and the associated compliance schedule reports;
• state that the inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures have been fully complied with during the previous 12 months;
• have attached to it all Form 12A certificates issued by IQPs for the specified systems;
• have attached to it any recommendations from an IQP to amend the compliance schedule.

The warrant itself is Form 12: Warrant of fitness, prescribed by the Building (Forms) Regulations 2004. Its key sentence is short and unqualified: "The inspection, maintenance, and reporting procedures of the compliance schedule for the above building have been fully complied with during the 12 months prior to the date stated below." It is signed by the owner, or by an agent "on behalf of and with the authority of the owner".

02

Who does what: the owner, the IQPs and the council

Three parties share the BWOF cycle.

• The building owner is responsible for the whole thing. The Compliance Schedule Handbook puts it plainly: it is the owner's responsibility to satisfy the obligations under section 105 of the Building Act, including ensuring that the inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures are carried out. The owner signs and displays the warrant, supplies it to the council, and keeps the compliance schedule and reports where the warrant says they are.
• The owner's agent, often a property manager, facilities manager or body corporate manager, can sign and supply the warrant for the owner. Form 12 has a section for the agent, including their relationship to the owner and "details of authorisation from the owner". The responsibility stays with the owner.
• Independent qualified persons (IQPs) are people or firms the council recognises as qualified to inspect, maintain and report on particular specified systems. MBIE's page on inspection and maintenance of specified systems says a compliance schedule "will usually require the more complex inspection and maintenance procedures to be carried out by an IQP", and that most systems need at least an annual IQP inspection, some six-monthly or quarterly. Each IQP issues a Form 12A for the systems they cover.
• The council (the territorial authority) issues the compliance schedule, receives the warrant and the Form 12As, and keeps them on record. MBIE's guidance for building officials says the council should review the BWOF and Form 12As it receives, and that "it is good practice to have a three- to five-year on-site audit cycle".

Form 12A, the certificate of compliance with inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures, is where the cycle can break. MBIE is explicit that "IQPs can only issue certificates for a specified system if the inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures set out in the compliance schedule have been fully complied with in the previous 12 months", and that it is an offence for an IQP to issue one when a system has not met these requirements. The handbook adds that a Form 12A cannot be amended or altered to create exceptions. There is no partial certificate for a year with gaps in it.

That matters to the building team because the compliance schedule does not only list the IQP's work. MBIE notes that "a building owner may be responsible for undertaking some less complex and more frequent inspection tasks". If those owner-side checks were not done, or were done and not recorded, the IQP cannot honestly certify the year, and the owner cannot honestly sign Form 12.

03

The yearly cycle, from compliance schedule statement to renewal

The BWOF runs on the anniversary of the compliance schedule, not the calendar or financial year. The sequence for a building is:

1. The compliance schedule is issued, usually with the code compliance certificate for the building work that installed or altered the systems. The council also issues a compliance schedule statement (Form 10). MBIE's page on specified systems and compliance schedules says the owner "must display the compliance schedule statement in a public part of the building for the first 12 months".
2. Through the year, the IQPs carry out the inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures the schedule sets for each system, and the owner's side carries out the more frequent checks the schedule gives to the owner, tenant or contractor.
3. Before the anniversary, each IQP issues a Form 12A for the systems they cover, with any recommendation to amend the compliance schedule.
4. On the anniversary, the owner or agent signs Form 12, attaches every Form 12A and any recommendations, and supplies the warrant to the council. A council may send a reminder, but the duty is the owner's whether or not one arrives.
5. The warrant is displayed. MBIE's Managing your BWoF pages say the copy must be where all building users can see it, such as the ground floor, lobby, entry foyer or reception. It stays up until the next anniversary replaces it.
6. The records are kept with the compliance schedule at the place stated on the warrant, for at least two years, ready for the council or anyone else with a right to inspect the building under any Act.

The first warrant is due twelve months after the compliance schedule is issued, when it replaces the compliance schedule statement. When a building changes hands, the new owner takes on the cycle from that point, and the council should be told who the new owner is. When building work adds, removes or alters a specified system, the compliance schedule is amended, and the next warrant and Form 12As must reflect the amended schedule.

Form 12 also asks for facts about the building: its current, lawfully established use, the number of occupants per level and per use, the year it was first constructed, and the highest fire hazard category for that use. If the use of a floor has changed since the last warrant, the form is where that shows.

04

What should sit behind the warrant

Section 110 of the Building Act requires the owner to obtain annual written reports on the inspection, maintenance and reporting procedures, signed by an IQP who carried out some of them, keep them for two years, and produce them when the council or anyone else with a right to inspect the building asks. MBIE's page on inspection and maintenance puts the everyday version: "The building owner must obtain and keep reports detailing inspections, maintenance and repairs from the people who have carried out the work. These need to be kept with the compliance schedule for at least two years after they have been issued."

Compliance schedules usually carry a reporting and recording statement. The example in the Compliance Schedule Handbook says the owner must keep records of all inspection, maintenance and repairs in the previous 24 months, and that the records must, as a minimum, include:

• details of any inspection, test or preventative maintenance carried out, including dates, work undertaken, faults found, remedies applied, and the person who performed the work;
• details of any other faults found or maintenance and repair work undertaken to keep the system in working order, with the same details.

The handbook also says that, depending on the installation, it may be appropriate to keep records in a log book at the installation, with a summary report held with the compliance schedule, and that an IQP may keep the records on the owner's behalf. In practice a building's BWOF file usually holds:

• the current compliance schedule, and any amendments;
• the displayed BWOF and the copy supplied to the council, with the council's acknowledgement;
• each IQP's Form 12A and their inspection and maintenance reports;
• the on-site log books for systems such as the fire alarm, sprinklers and emergency lighting;
• the owner-side check records the schedule calls for, such as the daily or monthly checks of escape routes and final exits;
• fault reports and the repairs that followed, with dates and who did the work.

The fourth and fifth items are the ones most often thin: the owner-side checks are done by caretakers, cleaners, security officers and building managers, and recorded on whatever sheet is to hand, if at all.

05

The checks between IQP visits

The Compliance Schedule Handbook sets minimum inspection frequencies for each specified system, to apply unless the nominated standard or document says otherwise. Several of the most frequent checks are simple visual ones that a competent member of the building team can do, if the compliance schedule gives them to the owner. For example, for final exits the handbook suggests inspections:

• daily, when the building is in use, for crowd occupancies, and for any building where building work is going on that may affect the exit;
• monthly, for all other occupancies.

The daily and monthly check for a final exit is that it can be opened and is not locked, barred or blocked. Fire separations, which include doors on escape routes, follow the same daily or monthly pattern, and the handbook adds a six-monthly inspection for crowd occupancies and an annual one for all other occupancies. Their daily and monthly check is a visual one: fire separations around exitways are looked at for damage or deterioration, particularly to closures, exposed fire stopping and surface finish, and for new penetrations without suitable fire stopping, and doors on an escape route are checked to see that they can be opened and are not locked, barred or blocked. Automatic doors on escape routes get the same opening check daily or monthly, with the mechanical inspection annually.

Always work from the building's own compliance schedule rather than the handbook's examples. The schedule is what the IQP certifies against, and it may set different frequencies, name a standard such as NZS 4512 for fire alarms or NZS 4541 for sprinklers, or give a task to the IQP that you expected to do yourself. Owner-side routines that work well tend to share a few habits:

1. A named person for each check, with cover for leave and a clear handover when the caretaker or contractor changes.
2. A check at each point, not a single tick for the building. A record that says exits checked does not show which of the eight exits was looked at.
3. The time the check was done, recorded when it was done, not filled in at the end of the week.
4. A missed check recorded as missed, with the reason, so that the IQP and the owner know about a gap before the anniversary rather than after it.
5. Faults reported to someone who will fix them, with the repair and its date added to the record, since the reporting and recording statement asks for faults found and remedies applied.

None of this changes who certifies what. The IQP still inspects, tests and certifies the systems; the building team's checks are the ones the schedule leaves to the owner.

06

Where the record fails

The warrant rarely fails for want of a form. It fails because of what sits behind it. The monthly exit checks are ticked on a sheet on the plant room door, filled in for the month in one sitting. A cleaner notices an exit blocked by deliveries and mentions it to whoever is passing. The IQP arrives and finds the owner-side checks cannot be shown for three months of the year, and a Form 12A cannot be issued until the gap is dealt with.

SiteClara is built for that everyday part. A tag at each exit, fire door, escape route or plant room lets the person doing the check scan it with their own phone and confirm what they checked, with a photograph when one is asked for, so the record shows which point was checked, by whom and when. A check that was due and not done shows as not done, and the supervisor records why. A fault reported at the tag goes to the team responsible for fixing it and stays on the list until it is closed, and a daily report tells the building manager what was checked and what is still open.

It is just as important to say what SiteClara does not do. It is not an IQP and does not inspect, test, maintain or certify any specified system. It is not the building warrant of fitness or a Form 12A, it does not fill in or supply Form 12, and it sends nothing to the council. It does not replace the compliance schedule, the IQPs' reports or the on-site log books the schedule requires. It is not a CAFM system and does not do rostering or time and attendance. Where the Building Act or the compliance schedule requires a particular record, SiteClara is the working record of the owner-side checks between IQP visits, not the statutory one.

07

Questions people ask

What does BWoF mean?

Building warrant of fitness. MBIE's Managing your BWoF pages describe it as confirmation that the building's specified systems have been inspected, maintained and reported on as required. It is the owner's statement, not an inspector's certificate: the owner signs it, supplies it to the council and displays it in the building.

Do all commercial buildings need a BWoF?

No, only those with specified systems. MBIE's page Buildings with compliance schedules for specified systems says every building other than a single residential building needs a compliance schedule if it contains a specified system, such as sprinklers, emergency lighting, a lift or mechanical ventilation, and that a building with a cable car needs one even if it is a single house. The warrant follows the compliance schedule, so an office, shop or apartment building with a specified system needs a BWoF, and a building with none needs neither.

How long does a building WoF last?

Twelve months. MBIE's Managing your BWoF pages say a building owner needs to renew the warrant every 12 months, signing, issuing and publicly displaying it, where all building users can see it, such as the ground floor, lobby, entry foyer or reception. Each new warrant replaces the one on display.

08

Where to read more, and a list to take away

MBIE's Managing your BWoF pages are the owner's starting point, with the prescribed forms on Forms for building maintenance management and the offences on Fines and penalties for offences relating to compliance schedules: failing to supply the council with a warrant, failing to display one, and displaying a false or misleading one each carry a maximum fine of $20,000, and councils can issue infringement notices for them. MBIE's guide Owners' responsibilities to ensure their buildings are safe to use sets out an owner's duties for the compliance schedule and the BWoF, including amendments, buying a building with specified systems, and penalties, and the Compliance Schedule Handbook sets out the inspection procedures system by system. Your council's building team administers the BWOF and can tell you which IQPs it recognises.

The BWOF is separate from a building's evacuation scheme, which Fire and Emergency New Zealand administers under the Fire and Emergency New Zealand (Fire Safety, Evacuation Procedures, and Evacuation Schemes) Regulations 2018; see Fire and Emergency's Evacuation schemes and procedures and our guide to the fire evacuation scheme.

Before the next anniversary, check that:

• you know the anniversary date of the compliance schedule, and the council's reminder is not your only prompt;
• every specified system on the schedule has an IQP, and every IQP knows the renewal date;
• the owner-side checks the schedule sets have a named person, a point to check and a record made at the time;
• missed checks were recorded as missed, with the reason, and caught up;
• reports, log books and Form 12As for the last two years are kept with the compliance schedule where the warrant says they are;
• the Form 12 details, including use and occupant numbers, still describe the building;
• the current warrant is displayed where every building user can see it.