FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (F.A.Q)
The Building and Construction Authority (BCA) required that an independent Building Survey company be engaged to carry out a Pre-condition / Pre-construction Survey to the affected properties in the vicinity of any construction works.
The main purpose of a Pre-condition / Pre-construction building survey is to protect both the Builder/Contractor and the Property Owners, hence, the party who is carrying out the building survey has to be a neutral and impartial entity. So that neither parties, Builder nor Property Owners can influence the Surveyors' reporting of the site being surveyed.
The final survey report has to replicate the exact existing conditions of the building/s to the best of the Surveyor's abilities.
The Answer is Yes!
Should the Builders, Consultants or Authorities have any further comments which requires the Surveyor to take additional photographs or to capture more of the critical details, it is the duty of the Surveyors to accede with the request, within reasonable means. So that it serves the benefits of all parties involved.
In all these years of our operation, we did not encounter any issues with any Builders, Consultants or Authorities as our surveyors are well experienced and have been working in this field for many years and are sufficiently competent. Our Surveyors knows what to look out for and how to carry out each survey systematically, diligently and analytically to capture most of the required conditions of any property.
We had one experience where the defects were quite serious and the structure required temporary shoring for support and our Surveyors were requested to take additional photos for the "before and after" installation of the temporary works. When all the repair works was completed, we were also commissioned to do a Post Condition Survey. The Consultant who engaged us was very happy with the job carried out by us.
For open or public accessible areas with no occupants (e.g. roads, public parks, PCN, bridges, external of HDB blocks etc), the pre condition survey can be carried out and can be completed on the same day.
However, for owners occupied properties, apartments, condominiums, commercial / office buildings where permissions for access are required, the Surveyors cannot provide you with a definite date of completion for any Survey, as it is entirely dependent on the number of units and availability of access to the properties which are required in that survey project. A good Building Surveyor will still endeavour to complete the survey in the shortest amount of time.
Common show stoppers are usually due to owners busy schedule, or they may be out of the country, hence, some surveys can only be done 2 to 3 weeks later. Tenanted properties require owner's permission, at times, uncooperative tenants do cause delays to Surveyors access to the properties. There are also properties that have been left vacant for a significant amount of time and locating of the owners are nearly impossible. Reasonable efforts will be committed to reach all the properties that is within the radius required for any survey.
As a responsible Contractor, you should seek advice from your Consultants – Architect or Engineer and adopt appropriate construction methods and take necessary precautions early in the project to minimise the potential impact on neighbouring properties, before commencement of any construction works.
It is also crucial to maintain a good relationship and establish good communication lines with the neighbouring property owners of the intended works and seek their understanding. And make good any damage repairs if inadvertently, damage does occur, even with all precaution taken.
At the same time, the contractor should address any concerns that neighbouring property owners raise, and where possible, incorporate their suggestions into your construction planning and / or schedule.
You or your project’s Qualified Person (QP) in charge could refer to Annex 1 – Framework for Risk-based Inspection issued by BCA on risk mitigation, for more information or alternatively, give us a call.
A Pre-condition / Pre-construction photographic survey is confined to a visual inspection of the properties concerned. The survey will be conducted from ground level and will only cover all the easily accessible parts of the building and will exclude all areas / parts that are covered, unexposed, practically inaccessible, hidden from view or below ground / water, or forbidden by property owner to allow access.
The Pre-condition / Pre-construction photographic survey does not include testing or inspections of any building services such as mechanical, electrical, electronics, sanitary plumbing, fire protections system, any machinery or any services. The survey also does not include structural inspections including any testing, however, the survey is able to highlight any visible cracks or ground settlement during the photographic survey.
There will be occasions when the property owners flatly refused entry for the survey to be carried out or the house is left vacant or is abandoned and in a dilapidated state.
In such instances, the Surveyor will need to do their due diligence and work in accordance to the BCA’s guidelines :
- Building Surveyor will then just survey only the exterior face of the property.
- The following records should be kept:
- all attempts to contact relevant owners for permission to conduct the pre-condition / pre-construction survey (e.g. records of registered mail)
- refusal by owner to allow access to conduct the survey, with records of contact made.
Only experienced Surveyors will be able to advise you on the affected properties required to be surveyed from your worksite. To eliminate and prevent excessive unnecessary properties to be surveyed nor missing out on key/essential properties required to be included, just because it happens to straddle different road/address location.
On the other hand, it is also crucial for building contractors to provide sufficient details of the project, such as the nature of proposed building, method of construction intended, whether it has a basement and the specific type of pilings used for the project. The type of soil on the project site and other such information are available from the Soil Report.
These information are critical as they will determine the distance of the survey to cover for the construction project. Missing out on the survey of affected properties would be disadvantages to the Contractor. Unforeseen circumstances of losses/claims may arise as the Contractor would not have met the required guidelines set out in the Building and Construction Authority’s Guidelines on Pre-construction Survey due such missing factors of the project.
Contractors & Property owners will receive hard copies, full colour reports, after the survey has been completed.
Details of the Survey process has been detailed under "What Can You Expect?". Please click the link to find out more.