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Principal designers and principal contractors must submit mandatory occurrence notices and reports, during:

• construction of a new higher-risk building
• work on an existing higher-risk building, including work that causes it to stop being a higher-risk building
• work on an existing building that will make it a higher-risk building

A higher-risk building has at least:

• 7 storeys or is at least 18 metres high
• 2 residential units or is a hospital or a care home

A higher-risk building with at least 2 residential units must be registered with the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) as a high-rise residential building before people live there.

Accountable personsAccountable persons must submit mandatory occurrence notices and reports for the parts of the high-rise residential building they are responsible for.

What to report to BSR

You must submit a mandatory occurrence notice and report when a safety occurrence has caused, or is likely to cause:

• the death of a significant number of people
• serious injury of a significant number of people

A safety occurrence is an incident involving, or a risk that could cause:

• structural failure of the building
• the spread of fire or smoke in the building

A safety occurrence is something which if not remedied, could cause serious harm to people when the building is in use.

You must submit a report even if the safety occurrence is remedied immediately. The only exception is when a principal contractor remedies issues to ongoing building work, which are unlikely to risk significant numbers of death or serious injury.

Failing to report

If you know that a mandatory occurrence report has already been submitted to BSR, you do not need to submit a report for the same safety occurrence. You should obtain a copy of the report submitted to BSR to support your decision not to make the report yourself.

Reporting incidents to the fire service

If you report an incident to the fire service, you must also submit a mandatory occurrence notice and report if it meets the criteria of what to report to BSR.

Duties of principal designers and principal contractors

As a principal designer or principal contractor, you must submit mandatory occurrence notices and reports during construction or building work of higher-risk buildings.

The notices and reports relate to the building that is under construction or undergoing building work. They do not relate to safety incidents relating to the construction site in general or any temporary structures.

You must establish and operate a mandatory occurrence reporting system for others to report safety occurrences to you for review.

You can find out more about the roles of principal designers and principal contractors in the overview of the new building control regime on the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) website.

Safety occurrence examples

Some examples that could meet the criteria of what to report to BSR, include:

• defective building work, including defectivecompetent person schemework which is part of the wider building work
• fire safety issues likely to result in the spread of fire
• the use of non-compliant products or incompatible compliant products in the construction of the building
• inappropriate or incorrect installation of construction products
• product failure against specification and claimed performance
• faults in the design plans, caused by either design software or human error

Change control applications

If you submit a mandatory occurrence report, you may also need to make a change control application.

For example, during construction you discover the load points in the design plans have been miscalculated. If this is not remedied, it could cause structural failure and risks death or serious injury to a significant number of people when the building is in use. This meets the criteria of what to report to BSR and you must submit a mandatory occurrence notice and report.

To correct the plans, the principal contractor must also submit a change control application and request a major change to the building control application.

Transitional arrangements

If the higher-risk building in construction is subject to the transitional arrangements, you may not need to submit mandatory occurrence reports for it.

Readthe transitional arrangements for the higher-risk regime factsheet to understand reforms to building work processes and their regulations.

Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR)

During building work, if someone has died or has been injured because of a work-related incident you may need to make a RIDDOR report. For example, if someone has fallen from scaffolding and has died.

If an incident is reported under RIDDOR, you must also submit a separate mandatory occurrence notice and report if the incident meets the criteria of what to report to BSR.

You can find out about what must be reported under RIDDOR on the HSE website.

Duties of accountable persons

As an accountable person, you must submit mandatory occurrence notices and reports to BSR for the parts of the high-rise residential building you are responsible for.

Safety occurrence examples

Some examples that could meet the criteria of what to report to BSR when the building is occupied by residents, include:

• the spread of fire
• total or partial collapse of the building
• defective building work
• unexpected failure or the degradation of construction materials
• the discovery of structural defects
• failure of a critical fire safety measure, such as an automatic opening vent, smoke extraction or fire doors

The principal accountable person must establish and operate a mandatory occurrence reporting system for residents and others to report safety occurrences to the accountable persons.

Safety case

You should include all safety occurrences in the buildings safety case.

Safety occurrences before January 2024

If a safety occurrence was identified before January 2024, you must make a mandatory occurrence notice and report if one of the following applies:

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