Before-cover inspections and notice: who must see the work
At Friday's coordination meeting, the insulation foreman says his crew can start closing the exterior walls on Monday. The project manager asks whether the building inspector has passed the framing, and whether the consultant has had the notice the contract requires before work is covered. Nobody can answer the second.
Several parties can have the right to see work before it is covered, each through a different document, yet teams often track only the municipal inspection because it gets booked. A miss can be expensive: in Ontario, for example, a chief building official who has reason to believe covered work does not comply may order it uncovered at the expense of those responsible for the construction, if it was closed without a required notice or before the inspection period had passed.
Who may need to see the work
- The authority having jurisdiction, through the permit.
- The owner or consultant, through a notice clause in the contract.
- The engineer, through field reviews the specifications call for.
- A manufacturer, where a warranty depends on inspecting the installation.
- Your own QA/QC, through the company's inspection plan.
- Build a before-cover list for each area: what will be hidden, the inspections and notices each element needs, and the document requiring each.
- Read each notice requirement: who must be told, in what form and how far ahead.
- Give notice early enough for the inspection to happen before the covering trade starts. In Ontario, for example, the inspector must inspect within two business days of receiving most of the notices the Building Code prescribes.
- Record each notice: when, to whom, by what means, with a copy.
- Record each inspection: who, when, the result, any conditions or orders, and the report, filed with that area's photos.
- Release the area for cover only when every line is closed, and record who released it.
Common mistakes
- Treating the municipal inspection as the only one.
- Giving notice by phone and keeping no record of it.
- Closing a wall because "it passed yesterday" when the inspection covered another area.
- Filing the report apart from the photos of the same wall.
Checklist
Before an area is covered
- A before-cover list, with the document behind each line
- Each notice given and recorded, with a copy
- Each inspection recorded: who, when, result, conditions
- Orders closed, and re-inspected where required
- Reports filed with that area's photos
- The release to cover recorded, with a name
Check your understanding
The framing inspection passed, but the notice the contract requires to the consultant before cover was never given. Can the insulation start?
Show the answer
Sources
- Building Code Act, 1992, S.O. 1992, c. 23 (s. 10.2, notice of readiness for inspection; s. 13, orders not to cover and to uncover)
- 2024 Building Code Compendium (O. Reg. 163/24), Division C, Articles 1.3.5.1 (prescribed notices) and 1.3.5.3 (prescribed inspections)
- FAR 52.246-12, Inspection of Construction
