Certificate of acceptance

It's up to the council, but a certificate of acceptance can usually be issued for work done after 1 July 1992 (when building consents were introduced) and either:

• was urgent, necessary to protect lives or property and there was no time to get a consent (see section 42 of the Building Act 2004)
• an owner (or previous owner) should have got consent but didn't (under either the 1991 or 2004 Building Acts)
• an accredited building consent authority (not a territorial or regional authority) granted consent but is unable or refuses to issue a code compliance certificate.

The value of a certificate of acceptance to the building owner and a potential buyer will ultimately depend on how much of the work the council was able to inspect. In many circumstances, it's not possible to see everything so the certificate will only specify the elements of the building that can be approved.

A certificate of acceptance has some similarities to a code compliance certificate in that it will provide some verification for a building owner or future owners that part or all of certain building work complies with the Building Code.

A council should process a certificate of acceptance within 20 working days, and can either grant or decline your application. When a council issues a certificate of acceptance for building work it is not necessary for anyone to then apply for a building consent for that work.

If the application is declined the council must issue a notice to fix. The notice to fix should set out what remedial work needs to be done so that the work complies.