The OVK certificate must be displayed — where and how long

After a completed functional inspection, the building's owner must display the OVK certificate in a clearly visible place in the building. The requirement follows from Chapter 5 of the Planning and Building Ordinance (2011:338). The certificate shows when the inspection was carried out, what the result was and when the next inspection is due — precisely the information a resident, a tenant or an inspector needs to see that the building has been inspected.

What the certificate contains

The ventilation inspector issues the certificate in connection with the inspection. It must show

• the date of the inspection,
• the result of the inspection, and
• the date of the next inspection.

The certificate is therefore not a summary of the report. The remarks are in the report, not on the notice in the stairwell. If you want to know what the rest of the document says: how to read an OVK report.

Where should it go?

"Clearly visible place" is the wording in the ordinance, and Boverket's guidance makes it concrete: the main entrance or each stairwell. Two practical rules follow:

• If the building has several ventilation systems, the certificate for each system should go in the stairwell that system serves — or alternatively all certificates collected at the main entrance.
• If the energy certificate summary is already displayed, that is the place for the OVK certificate too. They belong together for the reader and it makes both easier to keep current.

A binder in the management office does not meet the requirement. Nor does a certificate in a locked room residents cannot access.

Does the OVK certificate really have to be in the stairwell, or is a binder enough?

It must be displayed in the building, in a clearly visible place — a binder is not enough. The purpose of the requirement is that anyone in the building can see the ventilation has been inspected without having to ask. The stairwell or the main entrance are the places Boverket's guidance points to, and in an apartment building with several entrances the stairwell is the practical choice. A certificate behind a locked door is formally displayed but does not meet the purpose, and it is the purpose an inspector assesses.

How long should it stay up?

Until the next inspection. The certificate describes a state valid until the date printed on it, so when a new inspection has been carried out the old certificate must be replaced by the new one. A certificate with a passed "next inspection" date still in the stairwell is in practice a posted notice that the inspection is overdue — visible to every resident and to every inspector who walks past.

Replacing the certificate therefore belongs with tracking the interval, not with filing the report. See OVK intervals.

The practical problem in a larger portfolio

The requirement is simple for one building and awkward for three hundred. The certificate is physical, it sits in a building you do not visit every month, and nobody gets a reminder when it goes out of date. In the portfolios we have worked with it is usually not the inspection that is missed — it is the certificate left over from last time.

An approach that works: tie the notice to the same tracking as the inspection date, and add "replace certificate in the stairwell" as its own item when a new OVK is registered. In Emphyx that becomes a task on the building in regulatory compliance; in a smaller portfolio it becomes a line in the same checklist as the rest of the inspection.

If you own a single-family house the display requirement does not apply to you — it targets buildings where people other than the owner are present.