Registered Design Practitioner DEP0001529 and Principal Design Practitioner PDP0000525. We design, declare and lodge regulated work on the NSW Planning Portal — for facade, structural, civil and waterproofing scopes across NSW.
The NSW Design and Building Practitioners Act 2020 changed how Class 2 (apartment) buildings are designed and documented. Every "regulated design" supporting building work must be prepared by, or under the supervision of, a Registered Design Practitioner — and a Design Compliance Declaration must be lodged on the NSW Planning Portal before any building work starts.
If your design touches any of these elements on a Class 2, 3 or 9c building, a Design Compliance Declaration is required.
For a Class 2 project that crosses facade, structure and waterproofing, you typically need multiple Registered Design Practitioners and a Principal Design Practitioner to coordinate them. We hold all three under one registration.
We confirm which scopes are "regulated design" and which building elements they cover. Yes/no verdict within 24 hours.
We prepare the regulated design to the relevant Australian Standards and NCC Performance Requirements — fully documented.
The Design Compliance Declaration is drafted, cross-referenced against the design, and signed by the Registered Design Practitioner.
The declaration is lodged on the NSW Planning Portal under our practitioner login — before any building work commences.
We retain the regulated design and supporting evidence for the 10-year statutory period — accessible if audited.
Common DBPA-regulated scopes we declare on Class 2, 3 and 9c projects:
It applies to building work on Class 2, 3 or 9c buildings (or parts of buildings containing those classes), and to certain alterations to those buildings. Pure Class 1 (houses) and pure Class 5–8 (offices, retail, warehouses) are not currently captured. Mixed-use buildings with any Class 2/3/9c part are generally treated as captured.
A Design Compliance Declaration (DCD) is lodged by the Registered Design Practitioner for a specific regulated design — e.g. the waterproofing design, or the facade design. The Principal's Design Compliance Declaration is lodged by the Principal Design Practitioner and confirms that all regulated designs for the project have been declared by appropriately registered practitioners and coordinate with one another. On a multi-disciplinary Class 2 project, both are typically required.
No. A Design Compliance Declaration must be lodged by a Registered Design Practitioner (or by a Principal Design Practitioner for the principal's declaration). Builders lodge a separate Building Compliance Declaration confirming the work was built in accordance with the declared design. The two declarations are complementary but not interchangeable.
Penalties under the Act are substantial — up to $660,000 for corporations, $110,000 for individuals, plus daily penalties for ongoing non-compliance. Beyond penalties, certifiers cannot issue Occupation Certificates without the declarations on file, so undeclared work effectively can't be completed and signed off.
Ten years from the date of the declaration. We retain all regulated designs, supporting evidence and the lodged declarations for the full statutory period — accessible on request and in the event of any audit.
The Act requires lodgement before the building work to which the design relates is carried out. Retrospective lodgement is not contemplated by the legislation and exposes the practitioner and the builder to compliance action. We can, however, lodge declarations for individual stages or trades as they reach construction — provided the design supporting each stage is in place before that stage starts.
The declaration itself isn't the cost — it's the engineering work that supports it. For a typical Class 2 waterproofing scope on an existing balcony, the design + declaration package starts from $2,800. Full multi-discipline new-build packages range from $8k to $45k depending on building size and number of regulated designs required. We fixed-fee quote upfront.
Yes. We declare DBPA scopes across all of NSW — including regional and coastal projects — from our Sydney (Surry Hills) office. Travel to site for inspections is quoted separately.
Tell us about your Class 2 / 3 / 9c project — we'll confirm which scopes need a declaration and quote the engineering work that supports each one. Usually inside 24 hours.
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