Building control sign off - please help

[Fourlittlepiggies]

We had a steel framed extension done a year ago but builders who buggered off mid way through, leaving us 30k down and with a HUGE amount of stress. We then hired a new builder to finish the work and get building control sign off but they have now also disappeared.

We will want to sell in the next 2 years. I am so drained from all of this, and had a baby as it was all going wrong. What do we do to get the neccessary sign offs? I have none of the structural drawings or evidence I think is needed. Luckily the extension is lovely inside but I think prospective buyers will give us a wide berth with the steel frame and lack of sign off. Please help.

Call the council. When we had an extension the builder would phone them to come out. Google the number for building control

Yes agree to call building controls at the council. Our building controls company went AWOL (I think they went bankrupt or something). We had to do a “reversion” to the council and then they signed it off for us. We did have to pay a fair bit though and I did have lots of photos from our builders. But anyway that’s the best place to start.

The council. You would have submitted this to them before the start then they come out whenever required and finally sign off at the end.

Thank you, I will try the council. The builders were using Stroma but didn’t pay Stroma’s bills either so they stopped working. Sadly Stroma wouldn’t finish the job unless we paid all of the unpaid invoices and produced the info/ photos that only the builders have.

Our private building g control also went bust and builders didn’t give a monkey’s, left us to it. Fortunately we had taken lots of photos. It cost us another £1000 in fees, but they were fine to deal with. It turned out that they were inundated with bust building regs clients so had to take a ‘pragmatic’ approach.

Did you go to the council directly?

Yes we did.
Council informed us that we might be able to obtain notes from bankrupt building regs company’s visits that they’d made before bankruptcy. We had to pay £100s to the agency, not knowing what they had on record. Fortunately they had evidenced the steels going in correctly, and then we had to evidence that everything they questioned in the notes had been done. As I said, after a (long, stressful) while, they took a pragmatic approach and accepted photos. We had to change some glass to make it toughened, which was perfectly reasonable.
Good luck, it’s a headache you don’t need but council will have seen it before and should be sympathetic.

Sorry you've had all this. One thing that might help with the missing paperwork - a steel frame will have needed a structural engineer's calculations, and the engineer will usually still have them even if the builder has gone. If you had a planning application, their name is sometimes on the drawings on the council's planning portal, or Stroma's file may name them. With the calcs, plus whatever photos you have, the council has something to work from, and they may only need to open up a few areas to check the connections and foundations rather than lots of the finished work.

It's also worth asking Stroma for copies of their inspection notes even if they won't carry on - the council will want to know what was already inspected.

No advice, but just offering my sympathies - we also had a rogue builder who buggered off halfway through the job, and it was incredibly stressful. Ours was a large extension so we had moved in with relatives for the duration, and ended up being out of our house for way longer than anticipated. Thankfully all is now finished by a new builder and signed off, and we do love the house, but it was really the most stressful period of my life and I have huge empathy for anyone going through similar

No advice but “you had a baby because it was all going wrong”? That’s quite the coping strategy!

I had to re-read to check what the heck I had written! As meaning at the time rather than because..! They did a runner when she was 2 weeks old.