Last updated: 15 July 2026
TL;DR — Haven Compliance inspects, installs and certifies window safety across the Sydney CBD and inner city — the CBD itself, Pyrmont, Ultimo, Haymarket, Darlinghurst, Surry Hills and Chippendale. Every openable window is tested against section 118 of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015: the 125mm opening limit and the 250 newton force requirement. We handle concierge access, lift scheduling and resident coordination in towers of 200+ lots, and we bring the same discipline to a five-lot Surry Hills terrace strata. Photographic reports, unit-by-unit registers and fixed per-unit pricing. Call +61 2 8000 0287.
Haven Compliance — a NSW specialist that does nothing but window safety: inspection, REMSAFE hardware installation, certification, compliance reporting and the annual cycle that keeps buildings continuously compliant. We serve the most concentrated strata environment in the state: within a few square kilometres, the inner city ranges from glass-curtain-wall residential towers overlooking Darling Harbour to converted wool stores in Pyrmont, terrace-row strata in the Surry Hills backstreets, student accommodation near UTS in Ultimo, and the compact terrace conversions of Chippendale backing onto Central Park.
That variety is precisely why a specialist matters here. The compliance question is identical in every one of those buildings — does each qualifying window restrict to 125mm and hold 250 newtons? — but the buildings ask it in completely different ways, and a provider who only knows one building type inspects the others badly. Our technicians work across the full spectrum every week, and our reporting looks the same whether the building has five lots or five hundred: every window tested, photographed and logged.
Density does not change the law — a qualifying window on level 30 of a Kent Street tower and one above a Chippendale laneway carry the same duty. The obligation traces to one section — 118 of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015, live since 13 March 2018 — requiring owners corporations to protect each qualifying window: openable, over an internal floor at least two metres above the outside ground, with the opening beginning less than 1.7 metres above the floor.
Compliance is measured, not assumed: the opening held to 125mm or less (or a robust screen fitted), and the hardware resisting 250 newtons of force, both per the AS 5203:2016 test method. A device an adult can release passes, so long as it re-engages; a flyscreen fails, always. And because the section binds the owners corporation across the entire building, windows inside private lots carry exactly the duty the corridor windows do.
Older Sydney CBD material got two things wrong, so here is the correction in writing. Yearly inspection: best practice, never statute — no interval exists in law. The penalty: $550 at most for a non-compliant owners corporation, with the real jeopardy lying in a preventable fall and the liability and insurance consequences behind it. Section 180 sets the record-keeping duty at 7 years.
Two extremes, and both are ours to manage. At one end, a single CBD tower can hold 200 or more lots across 30 or 40 floors under one owners corporation, with a professional strata manager, a building management team, concierge-controlled access, rigid visitor protocols and lifts that need scheduling for a full-building inspection. At the other, a five-lot terrace strata in Surry Hills or Darlinghurst may be entirely self-managed, with no professional manager, heritage constraints on the facade, mixed window vintages and owner-occupiers with strong opinions about hardware on their sashes.
Haven serves both ends deliberately. For towers, the inspection is planned as a logistics exercise: access sequenced floor by floor, building management looped in, residents notified in advance, and the register built so a 400-window building reads as clearly as a 40-window one. For boutique buildings, the work is closer and more consultative — we document what we find, explain why it matters, and recommend hardware that respects the building’s fabric while still passing the force test.
Heritage character is not an exemption from section 118, but it does shape which compliant device belongs on which window. In between sit the warehouse conversions of Pyrmont and Ultimo — big openings, non-standard frames, and devices that were improvised at conversion and have never been force-tested since. These buildings produce some of the most interesting inspection findings in Sydney, and some of the most necessary.
Four patterns dominate. Construction-installed devices that were never maintained: newer towers usually had restrictors fitted at build, but a decade of tenant turnover, window cleans and hard use loosens fixings and wears mechanisms — the device is present and fails anyway. Improvised hardware in conversions: wool stores and warehouses were converted before window safety practice matured, and the devices fitted then are frequently non-standard, unrated and unable to hold 250 newtons.
Removed and never refitted: the inner city renovates constantly, and every repaint or window replacement is a chance for a device to come off and stay off. Flyscreens doing a job they cannot do: in terrace strata especially, insect screens are routinely assumed to be safety devices. They are not. The pattern to notice: almost none of these failures are visible from the corridor. They are found by testing, which is the entire argument for testing.
Coordination first, disruption never. Before the visit we settle the access plan with the strata manager and building management: concierge protocols, lift bookings where a tower requires them, the unit sequence, and the resident notice — we supply a two-paragraph template that explains the child-safety purpose and reliably lifts first-visit access rates. Residents do not need to be home, and occupied lots are inspected under the scheme’s standard entry-notice process.
On the day, the technician works floor by floor: common property first, then lots in sequence — minutes per unit, every qualifying window physically tested for the 125mm restriction and the 250 newton hold, every result photographed. For very large buildings the schedule may run across consecutive days, with the register updated as each floor closes out. The full walkthrough of what happens on the day is in our inspection process guide.
Afterwards you receive the photographic report, the unit-by-unit register formatted for the scheme’s section 180 records, and — where anything failed — a fixed per-window remediation quote. Inner-city timelines being what they are, documentation is delivered the same day as the inspection, and the digital compliance certificate issues the moment the building’s position supports one — in time for the settlement, committee meeting or defect inquiry it was ordered for.
Tower pricing benefits from scale — per-unit rates fall as unit counts rise — while boutique buildings pay a small-scheme minimum rather than tower rates. The quote is built per unit and frozen before we book — unit count, access logistics and window volume are its only inputs. No hourly rates; no surprise lines. Pricing in the Sydney CBD follows the same published tiers as the rest of the state: single properties at $250 + GST, buildings of 2 to 10 units at $490 + GST, and larger buildings quoted fixed on request.
The same-day digital certificate is part of the fee, never an extra. Remediation, where windows fail, is itemised per window in REMSAFE hardware — and fitted during the visit itself where the committee has authorised it. Keeping the spend tight takes two decisions, not ten: book inspection and remediation together, and join the area’s grouped run. The overhead those two moves remove is the difference committees notice. Everything the engagement produces sits inside the one fee: inspection, photographic report, unit-by-unit register and the same-day certificate — with no add-on charges for documentation or hardware call-outs.
When the Sydney CBD committees compare providers, the number that matters is the full cost to certified compliance; a low headline fee that bills the paperwork separately, or returns twice to fit hardware, rarely stays low by the finish.
Strata managers running CBD portfolios are our core clients — many manage dozens of buildings within walking distance of each other, and we schedule across a portfolio in one conversation, with per-building registers and one consistent report format. Owners corporations and committees engage us directly, from tower committees to the self-managed terrace schemes of Surry Hills and Chippendale — our self-managed scheme guide exists for exactly those committees.
Landlords and property managers book unit-level inspections and end-of-lease checks for the inner city’s enormous rental stock. And developers and building managers bring us in when construction-installed hardware needs its first real verification. We cover the CBD itself plus Pyrmont, Ultimo, Haymarket, Darlinghurst, Surry Hills and Chippendale from the same scheduling run — neighbouring pages for Potts Point, Redfern and Glebe cover the next ring out.
Because window safety is a pass/fail legal test, not a line on a checklist. A generalist walks past a window and notes ” restrictor fitted”; a specialist tests whether that restrictor holds 250 newtons and stops at 125mm, photographs the result, and logs it against the lot — because after an incident, ” fitted” and ” working” are the difference between a defended claim and an indefensible one. Haven does the whole cycle with one accountable provider: the inspector who finds the failure and the installer who fixes it work for the same company, pricing is fixed rather than hourly, and the paperwork is built to survive hostile reading — by a lawyer, an insurer or a buyer’s solicitor.
And we are honest about credentials: NSW has no official certification scheme for window safety inspectors, so what you are buying anywhere is method and evidence. Ours is documented on every window.
With a cycle, not a scramble. Buildings drift out of compliance quietly — renovations remove devices, hardware wears, tenants change — so we run an annual reinspection and maintenance program: every device retested, maintenance-grade fixes done in the same visit, the register updated, and the committee handed a one-page picture of what changed. Our reminder system tracks each building’s cycle and contacts the manager ahead of time, so compliance renewal never depends on somebody’s calendar memory.
To be precise about the law, because this suburb’s marketing history deserves the correction: the annual cycle is best practice, not a statutory requirement. What the law does demand is a continuously compliant building — and an annual cycle is simply the cheapest, calmest way to deliver one. —
Every openable window where the internal floor sits 2m+ above the ground outside and the opening starts below 1.7m qualifies — in a tower, that is effectively every above-ground level. Level 35 carries the same duty as level two.
Access is planned with the strata manager and building management before the visit: entry notices, concierge protocols, lift scheduling and a floor-by-floor sequence. Residents do not need to be home, and large buildings run across consecutive days where needed.
No. Heritage character shapes which compliant device suits the window, not whether one is required. There are compliant solutions for timber sashes and heritage frames that pass the 250 newton test without disfiguring the building.
No — no statute fixes an interval, and any provider claiming annual inspections are mandatory is overstating the law. The section 118 duty is continuous, which is why an annual check is prudent best practice: it keeps the building provably compliant between years.
Most buildings are inspected in one to two days depending on size, and the digital certificate and photographic report are delivered the same day as the inspection — certificates issue as soon as the building’s position supports one. CBD compliance documentation is frequently needed on short timelines, and same-day delivery is the standard, not the exception.
Not sure which service tier fits your building? Our compliance specialists can help you understand your requirements and choose the right option.
