Practice directions

Confidentiality

A prescribed appointor must keep confidential the identities of the parties to the adjudication.

Conflict of interest

A prescribed appointor must ensure the adjudicator does not have a conflict of interest. This should be confirmed prior to appointing an adjudicator. If a conflict of interest exists, the prescribed appointor must select another adjudicator.

Fees

Setting fees

Prescribed appointors may set their own fees. The fees to be charged must be notified to the Building Commissioner and will be published on the department's website and related publications. A prescribed appointor should ensure that fees to be charged are readily available to the public through the prescribed appointor's own publications.

Collecting fees

A prescribed appointor may require a deposit against the likely fees before arranging an appointment.

Responsibility to update contact details

Prescribed appointors must ensure that the Building Commissioner is kept informed of changes to their contact details so that service of requisite documents can be effected and parties to a payment dispute have their legal rights preserved i.e. that the strict time frames in the Act are met.

Reporting requirements

All documents required under these reporting requirements are to be emailed to the Building Commissioner at cca@dmirs.wa.gov.au in Microsoft Word 97 format or equivalent.

Notification of receipt of application for adjudication

From 1 July 2020, where a prescribed appointor receives an Application for adjudication – Form 2 and appoints an adjudicator to determine the application, the prescribed appointor will need to provide certain information to the Building Commissioner in the form of a Form 3.

The information collected by the Building Commissioner is used for the purposes of preparing an annual report on the operation and effectiveness of the Act each financial year to the Minister for Commerce.

All information required in the Form 3, should be contained in the adjudication application, but, to the extent it is not, appointors are not expected to have to make their own enquiries to ascertain the information.

An outline of the reporting requirements utilising the Form 3 are as follows:

• For each application and appointment made by an appointor under the Act, the Form 3 needs to be completed and provided to the Building Commissioner. 
• The Form 3 must be completed and provided either on the date the appointment is made by the appointor, or within one business day of the appointment.
• The Form 3 must be forward by email to cca@dmirs.wa.gov.au. Please do not send a hard-copy.
• Where multiple applications are received involving payment disputes between the same parties, a Form 3 needs to be completed and provided for each of the applications.
• Appointed adjudicators will still be required to communicate to the Building Commissioner a copy of their determination, dismissal, or notice of any withdrawal (as the case may be) and their invoice for fees.

Section 28 of the Construction Contracts (Former Provisions) Act 2004 applies to the conduct of all appointments.