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Scottish Building Regulations
basics principles

Replacements that need to meet current standards

You can replace some parts of your home without a building warrant, provided you comply with the current building regulations:

 

  • Double glazed windows — requirements for ventilation, daylighting, safety, emergency escape, energy efficiency.
     
  • Boiler — requirements for energy efficiency and safety.
     
  • Bath, bidet — requirements for anti-scald valves if you change the position of a bath or bidet or add a new one.

Work that needs a building warrant

Always check whether you need a building warrant before you do any work that would alter the structure, introduce a greater risk to escape in case of fire, or increase the area of your property.

 

For flats, most work requires a warrant, including electrical rewiring and changes to bathrooms. Fewer projects in houses require a warrant, but any work that is covered by building regulations must comply with the regulations.

 

You may need a warrant for a biomass store, solar panel or wind turbine — it varies with the size and type of the installation and the effect the equipment might have on the building, such as changing the structural loading of the roof.

 

If in doubt, ask your local council building standards team.
extras
Scottish Building Regulations

Remember to check that your work complies with current Scottish Building Regulations.

Home improvements must not make the building any worse!

Whether or not you need a building warrant, building work must not worsen the existing building with respect to the topics that are covered by the building regulations — for instance:

Don’t weaken the structure of the building

For example —
by widening a window but with a beam that’s not strong enough to support the wall, floor or roof above; adding a solar panel that’s too heavy for the roof timbers

Don’t make it more dangerous in case of fire

For example —
by replacing opening first floor windows with double glazed windows that don’t open fully to allow people to escape

Don’t reduce ventilation and increase the risk of condensation or poisoning from boiler flues

For example —
by stuffing insulation into air spaces at the edges of the roof, building a conservatory over a boiler flue, blocking a boiler vent

Don’t interfere with the performance of the drainage system, including the sewers

For example —
by connecting a new WC to the wrong drain; damaging a drain when digging the trench for a ground source heat pump

Don’t make it more difficult to be used by a range of people, including people in wheelchairs

For example —
by removing an entrance level toilet to increase storage space; making a hallway more narrow

Don’t make upper storey windows or stairways less safe

For example —
by changing upstairs windows so that the cill is nearer the floor level, removing banisters from stairways to create an open plan look

Don’t reduce the sound insulation or the thermal insulation

For example —
by running plastic drain pipes through the floor without sound insulation if there’s a flat below, cutting channels for electric cables in a wall you share with a neighbour, recessing lights or speakers into a ceiling that forms part of the floor of the flat above

Don’t reduce the thermal insulation

For example —
by adding a heated conservatory with poor insulation performance
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