What happens to your project when your building control approver disappears overnight? For hundreds of London builders, this nightmare became a reality in November 2025 with the sudden collapse of Assent, one of the UK’s largest building control firms. This event has sent shockwaves through an industry already grappling with the Building Safety Regulator's (BSR) Gateway 2 backlog, leaving thousands of new homes and millions of pounds in project value hanging in the balance.
For London’s residential construction sector, the timing could not be worse. With an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 applications handled annually by Assent, its failure has created a black hole in the building control landscape. Projects awaiting Gateway 2 approval are now in limbo, facing the prospect of starting the entire, lengthy process from scratch. This isn’t just an administrative headache; it’s a direct threat to project viability, with holding costs, contractor delays, and a complete breakdown in project momentum.
The Building Safety Act introduced a more rigorous, three-stage gateway process for higher-risk buildings, with Gateway 2 being the crucial pre-construction approval from the BSR. However, this new system has been plagued by delays, with average approval times stretching to a staggering 43 weeks across the UK. London, which accounts for nearly half of all new build cases, has been hit particularly hard by this building safety regulator backlog.
The collapse of Assent pours fuel on this fire. As a key player, Assent’s two main entities, Oculus Building Consultancy Ltd and LB Building Control Ltd, were responsible for shepherding countless projects through this complex process. Their sudden disappearance leaves a void that the already-strained BSR will struggle to fill, jeopardising its target of clearing the 20,000-home backlog by January 2026. For builders, this means more uncertainty and a higher risk of building control approval delays that can derail even the best-laid plans.
The fallout from this building control crisis extends far beyond the initial shock. For medium-sized residential builders in London, the consequences are particularly severe:
•Project Paralysis: With Gateway 2 applications in limbo, projects are effectively frozen. This can lead to a cascade of contractual issues with subcontractors, suppliers, and clients.
•Spiralling Costs: Every week of delay adds to a project's holding costs. With London's high land values, these costs can quickly run into tens of thousands of pounds, eating into already tight margins.
•Lost Documentation: Critical project information, including vital communications with the building control approver, can be lost in the transition. This makes it incredibly difficult for a new approver to pick up the pieces, leading to further residential construction delays UK.
•Trade Coordination Chaos: Plumbers, electricians, and other trades rely on a clear project timeline. When approvals are delayed indefinitely, scheduling becomes impossible, leading to disputes and potentially losing skilled workers to other projects.
This situation highlights a fundamental weakness in how many construction firms manage their project information. When communication is fragmented across emails, WhatsApp messages, and text messages, a crisis like the Assent collapse can lead to a catastrophic loss of data. How can you prove what was agreed with the previous inspector? Where is the record of their site visits and approvals? This is where the true cost of disjointed communication becomes painfully clear, a problem that contributes to the hidden 11% cost destroying your construction budget.
In a stable environment, poor communication is a drain on resources. In a crisis, it’s a project killer. When your building control approver changes unexpectedly, you need a single, verifiable source of truth for your project. Without it, you are left scrambling to piece together a coherent history from a tangled mess of different platforms.
This is a challenge that Bonchurch BC, a London-based construction firm, understood well. Before adopting a centralised system, their management and maintenance divisions were losing a valuable hour every day just trying to keep track of project information. That’s an hour per division, per day, lost to chasing updates, clarifying instructions, and searching for documents. In the context of the Assent collapse, that lost hour could be the difference between a project that survives and one that fails.
While you can’t control the failure of a building control firm, you can control how you manage your project information. This is where a robust construction project continuity London plan becomes essential. Instead of relying on complex, enterprise-level software like Procore, which is often too expensive and cumbersome for the residential market, or tools like Fieldwire and Coconstruct that aren't tailored to the specifics of UK building regulations, London builders need a solution designed for them.
BRCKS provides a centralised platform that solves the core problems exposed by the Assent crisis:
•Centralised Documentation: All project documents, from plans and specifications to building control correspondence, are stored in one place. If your approver changes, you can grant access to the new inspector instantly, providing a complete and auditable project history.
•Seamless Communication: BRCKS replaces fragmented email and WhatsApp chains with a single, project-specific communication hub. Every conversation, decision, and approval is recorded and easily searchable.
•Trade and Subcontractor Coordination: With a clear, centralised schedule and communication channel, you can keep all your trades informed of any delays or changes, minimising disruption and maintaining goodwill.
By creating a single source of truth for your projects, BRCKS gives you the resilience to navigate unexpected industry shocks. It transforms your project records from a liability into an asset, ensuring that you are always in control, no matter what the market throws at you.
The Assent collapse is a wake-up call for the London residential construction industry. It underscores the urgent need for builders to modernise their project management and communication systems. While the BSR works to clear the Gateway 2 backlog, the responsibility for project resilience lies with the builders themselves.
Now is the time to move away from disjointed, analogue processes and embrace a digital-first approach. By investing in a centralised platform like BRCKS, you can future-proof your business against the next industry crisis and ensure that your projects remain on track, on budget, and fully compliant.
The construction industry will always be unpredictable. Don’t let your projects be a casualty of the next crisis. BRCKS is currently in beta, offering London’s residential builders a chance to get ahead of the curve. Visit our website at www.brcks.io to learn more and join the waitlist.
•Gateway 2 Delays: How London Builders Stay Organised and Ready
•London’s Construction Crossroads: How to Thrive Amidst a Housing Crisis and Skills Shortage
