News

Well, it sure has been a long time in the making, and with a lot of blood sweat and tears along the way, we’re very excited to finally launch our brand new website to complete our re-branding process! Building Issues has come a very long way in the last 4-5 years, rapidly becoming one of the largest regionally based Building Surveying and Consulting Firms in Victoria and we thought it was time for our image to evolve along-side our new…

The Metropolitan Fire Brigade’s Post Incident Analysis Report into the Lacrosse Docklands apartment fire in November 2014 has highlighted the issue of the non-compliant use of building materials, and non-compliant building materials in the Australian building supply chain. It is the responsibility of all participants in the industry to be diligent in ensuring building materials are suitable for use and meet the standards set by the Building Code of Australia (BCA). It is essential that only building materials that are…

In response to community expectations the VBA have produced a reference document for an acceptable standard of workmanship to cover potential areas of dispute in domestic construction from preliminary site works, to floor finish, framing, brickwork through to completion. The Guide to Standards and Tolerances (the Guide) has been developed for use by builders and building owners as a convenient reference for acceptable standards of workmanship in domestic building construction. Most domestic building disputes arise because of disagreements between building…

There is common misconception of recent, regarding concrete polishing concrete in bathrooms and other wet areas (laundries, toilets, powder rooms, etc).  Internal wet areas must be waterproofed to stop water transferring through the concrete slab and the wall floor junction. Bathroom and wet area floors are able to have polished concrete installed, however the correct procedures need to be followed to avoid having the headache of trying to rectify quite a tricky problem at completion of your project. Firstly, consultation…

Building work may sometimes adversely affect adjoining properties.  Owners proposing to build have obligation under the Building Act 1993 (the Act) to protect adjoining property from potential damage.  If building work is close to or adjacent to the adjoining property boundary, protection work may be required to ensure that the adjoining property is not affected. Protection work provides protection from damage to the adjoining property.  This includes: Under-pinning of footings to buildings on adjoining property Retaining walls where site cutes…

Most of you will already be aware of the commonly desired design of having an alfresco or portico at the same finished floor level as the dwelling, however what doesn’t appear to be common knowledge is the fact that this isn’t necessarily a deemed-to-satisfy solution due to the requirements of the BCA (Volume 2) for an alfresco, porch and other external paved surfaces adjacent to the building must be at least 50mm below the finished floor level of the dwelling…