Propensity of architects to commit fraudulent certification in Malaysian housing development projects

Abstract

The Housing Development (control & licensing) Act 1966 (Act118) with its delegated relevant Regulations, were enacted to control the contractual outcomes of public housing developments and housing agreement dispute. Based on this legal administrative framework are the Sale and Purchase Agreement (S&P) that set out the many various respective rights, duties and obligations that bind the parties to the building development contracts commonly administered by the therein nominated project architect. As the nominated architect is, under the auspices of the Pertubuhan Architect Malaysia (PAM), duty bound to competently, fairly and impartially direct and, resolve in the first instance, all queries and conflicts, the architect is procedurally deemed fully equipped to fulfill these duties.This research seeks to identify potential major pitfalls and loop-holes associated with the administration of public housing projects. The development contracts are governed by the Housing Development (control & licensing) Act 1966 and the Housing Developers (Control and Licensing) Regulations 1989. The identification of these issues will be of particular value to the relatively inexperienced architects having to deal with very experienced contract and regulations administrators. Particularly, these research outcomes seek to equip the inexperienced architect with the skills necessary to recognize the dangers of one or more of the contractual parties seeking to pressure the architect to make premature determinations and to issue ‘obvious’ fault certification. Keywords: Housing Development Act, Regulation, Premature and Fault Certification.