The Building Safety Regulator (BSR) is set to raise its charges by up to 5.1 per cent from next week.
It will increase the prices of almost all services for which it charges from Tuesday 1 April, by between 4.6 and 5.1 per cent.
As of Tuesday, clients will be charged £189 per higher-risk building (HRB) application to the BSR’s building control function.
Developers will also be charged £151 per hour for time spent working on the application, as well as “any other costs of relevant authorities and third parties”.
Previously the regulator charged £180 for an application and £144 per hour.
The Building Safety (Regulator’s Charges) Regulations, which came into effect in October 2023, give the BSR the power to charge for certain functions.
A pricing document released by the BSR said: “In line with HSE [Health and Safety Executive] strategy, the costs of these services are recovered through charges to make sure those benefiting from the service bear the cost.
“This ensures a proportionate approach where those whose activities need the highest level of intervention and oversight will pay the highest cost.”
Charges also apply for applications for a direction and decision to dispense with or relax a requirement where the regulator is the building control authority. This will now cost £113 per application, up from £108 previously, plus £151 per hour of staff time worked and any other costs incurred.
The same charges apply to submitting any notifiable changes to the regulator during construction.
Consideration of a completion certificate application, or partial completion certificate application, once relevant building work has finished, will now cost £227 per application, up from £216, plus £151 per hour worked by BSR staff and any relevant costs.
For any instances where the BSR becomes aware of the use of short-lived materials in a build, that drainage for two or more buildings might be better combined, or that water supply has not been provided correctly, the hourly staff rate of £151 plus any other costs incurred will apply.
The cost of registering a new or existing HRB by a principal accountable person will remain £251.
Organisations or individuals wanting to register as building control approvers will have to pay a £4,494 registration charge, which is unchanged, plus £130 per hour worked by BSR staff, up from £124 per hour. A £3,439 annual maintenance charge will also apply from the second year.
More information is available from the HSE, which oversees the BSR.
Last week, MPs on the Public Accounts Committee said delays to building control approvals by the “under-resourced” BSR were holding up work to remediate dangerous cladding on the highest-risk buildings.
“We are alarmed to hear that BSR approvals are typically taking four to five times longer than the targeted 12 weeks,” they said in a report.
In February, HSE chief executive Sarah Albon acknowledged that “teething troubles” with the BSR’s regulation of building work had led to delays but said that “a very large proportion of cases” fail to comply with the necessary requirements at first.
The functions of the BSR are set to be incoporated within a larger, single construction-sector regulator, which will also issues licences to contractors showing they are competent to work on high-risk buildings, from 2028. The move was a recommendation of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry phase two report, which the government accepted in February.
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Ian Weinfass