Apartment & Strata Inspection Software for Australia
Defect inspections for owners corporations, SBBIS reports, AFSS compliance, and post-DBP Act accountability, purpose-built for Australian strata.
Australian apartment buildings have been through a regulatory earthquake. The 2018 Opal Tower and 2019 Mascot Towers crises forced state governments, particularly New South Wales, to fundamentally rewrite the rules for designers, builders, and certifiers. The Design and Building Practitioners Act 2020 created a statutory duty of care that flows to subsequent owners. The Strata Building Bond and Inspections Scheme requires independent defect reports at 15-18 months and 21-24 months. Annual Fire Safety Statements demand accredited assessment of every essential fire safety measure. Behind every one of these obligations is an inspection, and behind every inspection is the documentation that decides whether it stands up to scrutiny.
Real-world challenges
What inspectors and asset owners in this sector deal with every day.
Waterproofing is the number one defect category
NSW Building Commissioner reports have consistently cited waterproofing failures, balcony membranes, bathroom wet areas, planter boxes, basement tanking, as the leading defect in new apartment buildings. Rectification is disruptive and expensive.
SBBIS reports must come from a panel inspector
The NSW Strata Building Bond regime requires independent defect reports written by an inspector drawn from the NSW Fair Trading panel. The reports must be defensible enough to support a bond claim against the developer.
Common property vs lot is the most disputed line in strata
Every defect inspection has to identify whether the finding is the owners corporation's responsibility or an individual lot owner's. Get it wrong and the levies dispute that follows is brutal.
Annual fire safety compliance is unforgiving
The AFSS regime in NSW (and Essential Safety Measures equivalent in VIC) requires accredited assessment of every fire safety measure listed in the building's schedule. Late lodgement triggers penalties and personal duty exposure for the owner.
Regulations and standards we support
InspectAndGo handles the documentation requirements behind the major Australian apartment regulatory regimes.
DBP Act 2020 (NSW)
Design and Building Practitioners Act, statutory duty of care, declared designs, registration of practitioners. Applies to NSW class 2 buildings.
SBBIS
Strata Building Bond and Inspections Scheme, 2 percent bond against defects, interim and final independent reports at 15-18 and 21-24 months.
AS 4654 / AS 3740
External above-ground waterproofing membranes (4654) and waterproofing of domestic wet areas (3740), the standards behind most apartment defect rectifications.
EP&A Regulation
NSW Environmental Planning and Assessment Regulation. Annual Fire Safety Statement obligations and Competent Fire Safety Practitioner accreditation.
iCIRT
Independent Construction Industry Rating Tool operated by Equifax, buyer-facing trust signal for developers.
Strata Schemes Management Act 2015
NSW common property boundary rules. VIC uses Owners Corporations Act 2006, QLD uses BCCM Act 1997.
How InspectAndGo helps
- Multi-storey and high-rise handled properly: a plan per level plus external elevations (site, facades, roof), with each defect pinned to exactly where it is on that level rather than dumped on a single drawing
- A statutory defect schedule in the standard strata format (defect number, level, area, location, observation, breach, photograph), generated from the walk-through instead of typed up afterwards in a spreadsheet
- Defect inspection templates structured by section (common property areas, individual lot reviews, plant rooms, fire systems) with photo capture per item
- GPS-verified photos with timestamp embedding so the audit trail is unambiguous when claims are made under SBBIS or DBP Act duty of care
- Defect categorisation aligned to standard severity tiers, major, minor, maintenance recommended, for clear OC reporting
- Common property versus lot tagging on every defect, so the responsibility line is documented at capture time, not negotiated later
- Comment library pre-loaded with common waterproofing, fire safety, and structural defect descriptions
- AI-assisted report generation produces a structured defects schedule ready to support SBBIS or warranty claims
- Works offline in basement car parks, lift motor rooms, and roof plant areas with no signal
- Export defect schedules as PDF, CSV, or share securely with the OC committee via ShareAndGo
Recent articles
All articles →Strata Inspection Report Template for Body Corporate Managers
How to structure a strata complex inspection report with section cloning, common property assessment, and compliance requirements for body corporate managers.
Common Property vs Lot Owner Responsibilities: Who Pays for What Defect?
The line between common property and lot is one of the most disputed concepts in Australian strata law, and it determines who pays the bill.
Pre-Settlement Inspection Rights for Off-the-Plan Apartment Buyers
Buying off the plan means waiting years to see your apartment, and the pre-settlement inspection is your one practical chance to identify defects before settlement.
Building Manuals for Australian Apartments: A New Compliance Expectation
Building manuals, the as-built documentation handed over at completion, are slowly becoming mandatory for new apartment buildings, and existing OCs are catching up.
Frequently asked questions
Can I use InspectAndGo for SBBIS interim and final reports?
+
You can use InspectAndGo to capture and structure the underlying defect data. The SBBIS regime requires the report itself to be prepared by a building inspector drawn from the NSW Fair Trading panel. InspectAndGo is the field tool that panel inspectors use to produce the inspection record.
Does it handle common property vs lot tagging?
+
Yes. Every captured defect can be tagged as common property or lot owner responsibility, and the AI report generator groups defects accordingly. This is the single most useful feature for owners corporations who need to allocate rectification cost.
How do you handle AFSS and ESM?
+
AFSS and ESM assessments must be performed by an accredited Competent Fire Safety Practitioner. InspectAndGo gives those practitioners a structured field tool for capturing test results, photos, and defect findings against the building's fire safety schedule. The platform does not replace accreditation, it gives accredited assessors a better field workflow.
What about Victoria, Queensland, and other states?
+
The DBP Act and SBBIS are NSW-specific, but waterproofing standards (AS 4654, AS 3740), strata legislation (VIC Owners Corporations Act 2006, QLD BCCM Act 1997), and ESM regimes apply nationwide in their respective forms. InspectAndGo works across all jurisdictions.
Can owners corporations use it themselves?
+
Yes. Larger OCs and strata managers use InspectAndGo to maintain ongoing defect schedules between formal inspections, document maintenance issues, and build a complete asset history that supports future warranty or insurance claims.
Do you handle multi-storey and high-rise buildings?
+
Yes. You upload a plan per level, plus external elevations for facade, balcony, and roof defects, and pin each defect to its exact location on that level's plan. A twenty-storey tower is navigated level by level in the field, not crammed onto a single drawing.
Can it produce a statutory defect schedule?
+
Yes. Alongside the full report, InspectAndGo generates a numbered defect schedule in the standard strata format (defect number, level, area, location, observation, breach, photograph), built straight from the walk-through rather than typed up afterwards in a spreadsheet.
Document apartment defects properly the first time
Free 14-day trial. GPS-verified photos, structured defect schedules, and AI-assisted reports, built for the post-Opal Tower regulatory environment.