The five stages → Compliance
Compliance record
One folder per unit holds the certificates and the dated test records. Each has a renewal date, and that date is diarised from the certificate rather than from the last time somebody remembered.
What is held for each unit
The folder is ordered the same way for every unit so that it can be read by somebody who did not build it: certificates by type, then dated test records newest first, then correspondence. Nothing is filed by the date it arrived in the office.
| Record | What it covers | Renewed |
|---|---|---|
| Gas safety record | every gas appliance and its flue, by a Gas Safe registered engineer | every twelve months |
| Electrical installation condition report | the fixed wiring of the whole unit | every five years, and read again at a change of tenancy |
| Electrical installation certificate | new circuits and alterations carried out during the works | issued once, at second fix, kept for the life of the installation |
| Energy performance certificate | the unit as assessed | every ten years, or sooner where the fabric changes |
| Alarm test record | that every smoke and carbon monoxide alarm was tested and working | at the start of every tenancy and at each periodic visit |
| Legionella risk assessment | the water system, stored water and any dead leg | reviewed when the system changes or the unit stands empty |
| Building control completion certificate | notifiable work carried out during the refurbishment | issued once, kept permanently |
| Window installation certificate | replacement windows, from the installer’s own registered scheme | issued once, kept permanently |
| Deposit scheme certificate | that the deposit is protected | once per tenancy |
Records tied to a tenancy rather than to a date
Three of the records above are checked at the start of every tenancy whatever their renewal interval says, because the tenancy is what they are really tied to.
The alarm test record is taken on the first day of the tenancy, with the tenant present, and the tenant is shown how to repeat the test. The electrical installation condition report is read at a change of tenancy even where its five years have not run, because alterations made during a tenancy — a shelf screwed through a cable, a socket added by somebody else — are precisely what it would catch. The gas safety record is handed to the tenant at the start of the tenancy, and within twenty-eight days of each new record being issued after that.
A renewal that falls due while a unit is empty is still done on its date. An empty unit is the easiest one to get an engineer into, and a certificate that lapses while nobody is living there is the one that is discovered at the worst possible moment, which is the day a tenancy is due to start.
Where the folder goes when a unit leaves
The folder is the pack. When a unit is sold, most of what the buyer’s solicitor asks for is already in it in the order they ask for it, and nothing has to be chased from a contractor after the event. What is sent, and what is held back because it belongs to the tenancy rather than to the unit, is set out on selling a unit on.
How long each record is kept, and who it is shown to, is on the records and privacy page.