Statutory maintenance

What is required versus what is chosen

All the maintenance of a business's premises falls into one of two boxes. The first holds what nobody asks the business to do: cleaning the extractor hood filters more often, painting the dining room, replacing the gym's treadmills before they fail. The second holds what a regulation requires, with a date, with an authorised company and with a certificate or a report that has to be produced on request. That second box is statutory maintenance.

Its basis is the Spanish Industry Act (Ley 21/1992, de Industria): the safety regulations made under it may require equipment to be checked for operation and state of repair or maintenance through periodic inspections (Article 12(2)), and the autonomous communities may add requirements for installations in their territory (Article 12(5)). From there come, among others, the inspections for fire protection, for thermal installations, the low-voltage inspection and the one for lifts. Health law adds its own, such as legionella or HACCP in food premises.

What applies to each business depends on what it has inside and on its size. RIPCI, for example, requires an inspection by an inspection body at least every ten years (Article 22(1)), but exempts a shop or a public venue of under 500 m² and an office of under 2,000 m², unless they have high special-risk areas or storage areas (Article 22(2)). The list by sector is in regulations by type of business.