Know your responsibilities

LBP or not everyone carrying out design work has the same responsibilities

Under the Building Act 2004, people who take part in building work have certain responsibilities. In the last edition of Under Construction, we looked atbuilders’ responsibilities on-site, includingthose of Licensed Building Practitioners(LBPs). This time we are looking atdesigners’ responsibilities.

Some of these responsibilities are highlighted under sections 14A–14G of the Act to ensure that if you undertake building work, you are responsible for your part of the project.

Who is a designer?

Section 14D applies to designers. It states that, for the purposes of these responsibilities, a designer includes anyone who is preparing plans and specifications for building work (not necessarily under a building consent).

It also includes giving advice about building work compliance with the building code, whether or not the work requires a building consent.

This means that designers could include:

• A person holding a Design licence (1, 2 or 3).
• An architect who is preparing plans and specifications for a building consent application.
• An engineer engaged to inspect building work undertaken to ensure it is structurally compliant.
• A builder who takes on the role of a designer and drafts some plans for a client detailing a low-level deck that will not require building consent.

Designers’ responsibilities

A designer has only one responsibility under section 14D, unlike a builder who has several under section 14E. The designer’s responsibility is to ensure that their advice or plans and specifications, if followed, will result in building work that complies with the Building Code. As the designer may not be involved in the construction, they are not responsible for whether the building work complies with the Building Code.

Designers’ obligations

It is important that designers are aware of their other obligations that relate to, but are not specifically mentioned in section 14D. This includes being aware of and not breaching any of the grounds for discipline for an LBP, which are set out under section 317.

Other sections of the Act also state that you need to be licensed to carry out or supervise design Restricted Building Work.

New competency changes

In 2016, small changes were made to the competencies in the LBP Rules for the Design licence class to keep them relevant and easier to understand. Also, a new competency was added for contract administration and construction observation and applies to Design areas of practice 2 and 3. However, you should also be aware that contracting obligations were included in other competencies for Design 1 licence class holders, as well as other minor changes.

The importance of contract administration is illustrated by elements of it being included as a core competency. A designer who acts inappropriately in their role of contract administration could face sanctions because such conduct might breach a ground for discipline relating to negligence or incompetence.

You can read more about the design competency changes in Codewords issue 76 at www.building.govt.nz.

This article first appeared in Codewords – Issue 82