The Ukrainian State Architecture and Construction Inspectorate has recently presented an updated electronic service involving the online registration of notices of commencement of construction works in respect of facilities that are built under a construction certificate.

Delovaya Stolitsa looked into the matter together with Drozdova & Partners Law Firm Director Olena Drozdova.

The expert has reminded that the commencement and successful completion of construction of a facility that involves minor consequences requires filing a notice with the Inspectorate (Article 34 of the Urban Planning Regulation Act. Facilities that can be erected under construction certificates and without obtaining any permits include single family (country) houses, garden cottages and weekend houses of up to two floors (with an area not exceeding 300 m²), and outbuildings and amenities.

Although the service of filing online notices of the commencement of construction has been already available for couple of years, it was not computer-aided in its entirety. At the end, civil servants who manually entered relevant data in the uniform register of construction permits considered each notice filed by citizens. Accordingly, there was a risk that human factor could influence the decision-making.

‘Especially dangerous and the most frequent cases included situations where applicants did not yet have any property rights to relevant land, but undertook construction on its own on land of another,’ Olena Drozdova said.

The updated format, which has been introduced a couple of weeks ago, allows to eliminate that exposure. Once a form is completed, the software application will process data and the notice is registered automatically with the user receiving the answer almost immediately. And all this is done without any undue delays or opportunities for abusive practice.

According to the experts, this is the only one electronic administrative service in Ukraine that is provided in fully automatic regime without any involvement of civil servants.

However, electronic construction-related services were used approximately five thousand times only after their launch. The reasons for that could include poor awareness, mistrust or a regular habit to do everything in the same old way. It looks strange with global computerisation of the society and our commitment to the European conditions of living.

Therefore, the government’s priority should be to teach people how to use innovations, while those who have tried them should share their experience. ‘Ukrainians should adopt the Danish experience of developing and distributing special multi-media training programmes that allow users to learn about how to use services because it is not sufficient to develop a system – you should know how to use it,’ Ms Drozdova points out.

The new online registration of notices of commencement of construction works under a construction certificate is easy to use in terms of its functionality. If desired, one can master it easily or ask for help the very same State Architecture and Construction Inspectorate that has provided a sufficient number of communication channels. It will anyway take less time than going to somewhere and filing documents by hand.

To use the updated service, please visit the electronic service website of the State Architecture and Construction Inspectorate www.e-dabi.gov.ua

To have your notice registered, you will require:

• an electronic digital signature,
• registered title to a land plot, and
• a construction certificate.

It will take a couple of minutes for the user to receive the answer at his or her specified email after the notice is filed.