Building Control Query

Enemies.Closer

I am looking advice on the above.

I want to view my neighbours building control approval plans which were approve by them in the mid 1980s. I rang last week and asked the girl if they were approved or not and she put me on hold but did not silence or cover the phone and she asked a colleague that the plans I was inquiring about were sitting with a status of rejected what should she do?

I was then passed on to the head of building control in my area and he advised that the plans had been approved. I then queried the earlier comment but he just insisted they were approved. I then quoted the freedom of information I was allowed to view these plans in the office but to my surprise he told me I was not due to data protection.

It was my understanding that anyone had the ability to view approved building control plans in the office paying a fee of course am I not correct with this assumption?

Any advice would be great.

jjd

You should be able to view any plans. Maybe if it's from the 1980's the plans could be 'gone' or were not very detailed to start with.
There is sometimes a small charge to view plans or have details posted to your home.
Is it building control or planning permission you are talking about. Local council building control deal with the building control side of things and the planning service based in larger designated councils cover planning permission for a number of smaller councils, but for planning permission to be granted it has to go through building control too....
Building control are only there to ensure that plans have been followed eg, check foundation depths, safety aspects and carry out site visits.
If a building has been insitu since the 1980's I would say there is very little that can be done about it. I am not 100% sure but to my knowledge if the changes were made more than 4 years ago it would be extremely difficult to get anything done about it.
If however the building changes have been there for the past 20-30 years why are you wanting to look at plans now? I think you have left it a bit late to be honest.

Enemies.Closer

Jjd thanks for the reply.

It is defo building control this I know because I have built a few houses in the Past so know the procedure.

They defo would have them in the office and I thought I sholud be allowed to view them. I will visit the office, does anyone know the legislation that enalbes me to view these building control plans?

BatCat

Hi,
I'm not sure they would have them any more in the office. We were looking for plans for a house extension done in the 1980s last year and were told that after a certain amount of time they no longer kept the files. In our case they did not have any plans for us to look at. Our plans were from 1986 I believe. We were also told at that time that you could only view the plans if you had the permission of the owner which I think is sensible.
Cheers,
BatCat

34Colly

Under freedom of information you should be able view the plans in the original Building Control file, however some councils will argue it does not cover copyrighted plans. I thought data protection was more about personal information held about individuals.

Old_Git

right we are all dead nosy and stuff like that ,so we want to know why you are interested in your neighbours building control .

slummymummyof3

Why on earth would you want to view building regs plans from the 1980's? I would have thought it highly unlikely they still have these in the office - they are likely to have been archived at the very least.

FIZILIZI

Building Control offices can vary in the way administration is carried out. Some offices have plans dating back to 1973 when Building Control was first introduced in Northern Ireland. I know of several offices that charge £20 to view BC files and if you want a copy of the plans there is an extra fee.

Your neighbours plans could have been rejected at one stage but then later approved.

If you can't get the plans at Building Control, you could ask them who the architect was and try the architect or you could try the Planning Office, they might have a copy of the plans if Planning Permission was required.