Building Warrant of Fitness (BWoF)
A Building Warrant of Fitness or BWoF is documentation that every building needs. A BWoF means that all specified systems listed within the building’s Compliance Schedule have been regularly inspected, maintained and reported on over the past 12 months. Passive Fire Protection falls into the specified systems category.
Every year before the expiry date Building Warrant of Fitness certificates must be renewed. Failure to do so is a breach of the Building Act. Building throughout New Zealand are failing due to non-compliant and non-existing passive fire system installed and documentation.
Renewal of a Building Warrant of Fitness requires building owners & facilities teams to employ Independent Qualified Persons (IQPs) to regularly maintain and inspect the specified systems listed within the Compliance Schedule. The Compliance Schedule includes in it for a an IQP inspector to inspect the passive fire in a building (fire separations smoke separations of a building).
Passive Fire fall into the specified systems category because it is referred to elements of a building’s infrastructure that are crucial to the health and safety of its occupants.
Compliance Schedule?
A Compliance Schedule is firstly issued by local council. A Compliance Schedule provides the record of a building’s specified systems, the inspection, testing and maintenance procedures required, as well as the personal that should complete the work and how often for all tested systems.
Passive fire protection needs to be subjected to rigorous installation documentation, inspections and assigned to a specialist for upkeep so that you are compliant.
All this information around passive fire protection is collected when applying for a building consent, you will need to correct documentation details. Once confirmed, your Compliance Schedule will be supplied when the building’s Code of Compliance Certificate is issued.
What Is An IQP?
An IQP (Independent Qualified Person) is a person or company, with no financial interest in the building, approved by the local council to carry out the necessary inspections/maintenance for a specified system.
Your local council will have a register of approved IQP inspectors/companies, the register will also identify the specified systems that the IQP is allowed to inspect or maintain.
A requirement of a BWoF is that you will need to obtain a 12A certificate from your IQP. A 12A form certifies that the inspection, maintenance and reporting requirements of the Compliance Schedule have been met over the last 12 months for each particular specified system.
Did you know it is necessary to keep a detailed record of all BWoF maintenance, inspections and any repairs undertaken for a minimum of two years. Any alterations or re-fits undertook that may cause damage to a firewall document and let us know we will be able to fix it in no time.
