Procedures of Shanghai Municipality on Housing Use Safety Management were adopted at the 105th Routine Meeting of the Municipal People’s Government on November 23, 2020, and are hereby promulgated. They shall be effective as of March 1,2021.

Mayor  Gong Zheng

December 14, 2020

Procedures of Shanghai Municipality on Housing Use Safety Management

(promulgated by Decree No. 39 of Shanghai Municipal People's Government on December 14, 2020)

Article 1 (Purpose and Basis)

With a view to strengthening the housing use safety management in this Municipality, ensuring the personal and property safety of citizens, legal persons and other organizations, and maintaining social and public safety, these Procedures are formulated in accordance with the provisions of relevant laws and rules.

Article 2 (Scope of Application)

These Procedures shall apply to the use safety and supervision and management activities of the houses legally constructed and put into use on the state-owned construction land within the administrative regions of this Municipality.

Where laws and rules have other provisions on the safety management of the use of cultural relics protection units, excellent historical buildings, historical buildings that need to be preserved and the houses within the scope of historical feature areas, the relevant provisions shall also be complied with.

The use safety and supervision and management of houses on collective construction land shall be separately prescribed by the Municipal People's Government.

Article 3 (Management Principle)

The housing use safety management shall follow the principles of putting prevention first, combining prevention with control, standardizing use and ensuring safety, clear responsibility and territorial supervision

Article 4 (Administrative Department)

The municipal housing administrative department is the administrative department responsible for the housing use safety in this Municipality; the district housing administrative departments are responsible for the specific supervision and management of the housing use safety in their jurisdictions.

The departments of development and reform, housing and urban-rural construction, planning and resources, finance, public security, fire control, state-owned assets, education, health, culture and tourism, sports, transportation, commerce, civil affairs, civil defense, government affairs, emergency management, market regulation, ecological environment, urban management and law enforcement shall implement these Procedures in coordination with each other according to their respective responsibilities.

Article 5 (Responsibility of District, Sub-district and Town)

The district people's governments shall establish comprehensive coordination mechanisms for housing use safety management to coordinate major issues in housing use safety management in their jurisdiction.

Town/township people's governments and sub-district offices are responsible for the comprehensive coordination and handling of the affairs related to the housing use safety management in their respective districts, and they shall strengthen the guidance and supervision of the owners' general meetings and the owners' committees in fulfilling their responsibilities for housing use safety.

The neighborhood (village) committees shall assist the town/township people's governments and the sub-district offices in carrying out the work related to the supervision and management of housing use safety.

Article 6 (Industry Management Requirement)

The departments of education, health, culture and tourism, sports, transportation, commerce, civil affairs, civil defense and government affairs shall, in accordance with their duties, supervise and implement the responsibilities for the housing use safety within the scopes of their industry managements, and may, according to their needs, formulate specific norms for the housing use safety management within the scopes of their industry management.

Article 7 (Insurance)

This Municipality encourages policies of liability insurance and property insurance related to housing use safety to be taken out, so that the capabilities to resist housing use safety risks may be enhanced, and encourages insurance companies to set up insurance types suitable for housing use safety.

Article 8 (Publicity and Popularization)

The housing administrative departments and other relevant departments, town/township people's governments, sub-district offices and neighborhood (village) people's committees shall strengthen publicity to popularize the knowledge of housing use safety, and enhance the public's awareness of safe use of the houses.

Article 9 (Public Supervision)

Any unit or individual has the right to complain and report to the relevant departments via the public service hot-lines or directly for any violation of the provisions on housing use safety management, and the relevant departments shall deal with them in accordance with the provisions.

Article 10 (Determination of the Person Responsible for Use Safety)

This Municipality implements the system of person responsible for housing use safety.

The owners of the houses are the persons responsible for the housing use safety. If the owner of a house is missing or the ownership of the house is unclear, the user of the house shall be the person responsible for the housing use safety.

For the public houses authorized by the governments to operate and manage and the houses managed by the housing administrative departments according to law, the housing operation and management units are the persons responsible for the housing use safety.

Article 11 (Obligations of Person Responsible for Use Safety)

The persons responsible for housing use safety shall perform the following obligations for

Housing use safety:

1. reasonably using the houses in accordance with their design purposes, the purposes recorded in the real estate registers and the public housing lease certificates, or the purposes approved according to law;

2. carrying out routine and emergency maintenance, renovation and transformation in accordance with provisions;

3. carrying out house safety inspection to eliminate potential safety hazards in time;

4. carrying out house decoration activities in accordance with provisions;

5. undertaking testing and appraisal to the houses, taking treatment measures for dangerous houses according to provisions;

6. taking termite control in accordance with provisions;

7. cooperating with relevant departments, town/township people's governments or sub-district offices in their supervision and management of housing use safety; and

8. other obligations on housing use safety prescribed by laws, rules and regulations.

Article 12 (Obligation of House User)

Where the owners of the houses are inconsistent with the users of the said houses, the users of the houses shall not only perform the obligations specified in Items 1, 3, 4 and 7 of Article 11 of these Procedures, but also perform other obligations on housing use safety prescribed by laws, rules and regulations, and shall cooperate with the persons responsible for housing use safety, the owners' general meetings and the owners' committees, the property service enterprises or the self-management executive agencies in their performing the corresponding obligations of housing use safety and management responsibilities.

Article 13 (Responsibility of Owners' General Meeting and Owners' Committee)

The owners' general meeting shall make clear the housing use safety issues within the property management areas via management regulations and other forms.

The owners’ committee shall perform the following responsibilities for housing use safety according to law:

1. supervising and urging the persons responsible for housing use safety and the house users to fulfill their relevant obligations prescribed in these Procedures;

2. supervising the property service enterprises to fulfill their responsibilities of housing use safety management;

3. according to relevant provisions and agreements, raising and arranging funds for the safety inspection, testing and appraisal, maintenance and renovation of the common parts of the houses;

4. cooperating with the relevant departments, town/township people's governments or sub-district offices in their supervision and management of housing use safety; and

5. other responsibilities for housing use safety prescribed by laws, rules and regulations.

Where the owners' general meeting decides to implement self-management, the responsibilities of the self-management executive agencies for housing use safety management shall be specified in the self-management items.

Article 14 (Responsibility of Property Service Enterprise)

Property service enterprises shall carry out daily inspection on the use safety of the common parts of the houses; before the flood season and in case of extreme abnormal weather such as typhoon and rainstorm, the inspection frequency shall be increased. The inspection of housing use safety shall be truthfully recorded and kept for future reference.

Where a property service enterprise finds an emergency endangering the safety of the house during the inspection, it shall immediately take emergency preventive measures.

Property service enterprises shall remind the persons responsible for housing use safety to conduct self-inspection on the exclusive parts of the houses.

Where a property service enterprise finds any violation of the provisions on the housing use safety management, it shall dissuade or stop such violation in time; if the dissuasion or stop is invalid, it shall report to the owners' committee and the relevant departments in accordance with the provisions.

Property service enterprises may be entrusted to perform the responsibilities of regularly organizing the inspection of housing use safety, assisting and guiding the persons responsible for housing use safety to eliminate potential safety hazards, etc., ,which shall be stipulated in the property service contracts.

Article 15 (Responsibility of Housing Development Unit)

Housing construction units shall fully bear the responsibilities of housing quality warranty according to law. When housing quality problems occur during the warranty periods, the housing development units shall timely repair and provide relevant repair materials to the property service enterprises or self-management executive agencies. The warranty periods after maintenance shall be implemented in accordance with the relevant provisions of the State and this Municipality.

During the warranty periods, in case of hollowing, cracking, falling off of the external wall of the house or falling off of the building accessories, the housing development units shall carry out investigation, formulate maintenance plans, and publicize the investigation results and maintenance plans in the property management areas according to the provisions.

Article 16 (Prohibited Acts)

The following acts endangering the safety of houses are prohibited:

1. damaging the load-bearing structure of the houses;

2. increasing the service load of the houses beyond the design standards;

3. illegally erecting buildings and structures; or

4. other acts endangering the safety of houses as prescribed by laws, rules and regulations.

Article 17 (Routine Maintenance)

The persons responsible for housing use safety shall, in accordance with the provisions, regularly maintain the houses and keep them in a safe state.

Article 18 (Safety Inspection)

The persons responsible for housing use safety shall, according to the use, structural type and service life of the houses, carry out routine safety inspection on the houses, and the frequency shall not be less than once a year; before the flood season and in case of extreme abnormal weather such as typhoon and rainstorm, special safety inspection shall also be carried out on the houses.

When the persons responsible for housing use safety carry out the safety inspection of the houses, they shall focus on the inspection of the external walls, the external windows, the cornices, the public entrance and exit halls, as well as the external frames of the air conditioners, the drying racks, the awnings and other external wall attachments.

The persons responsible for housing use safety shall truthfully record the safety inspection and keep them for future reference.

The persons responsible for housing use safety may entrust property service enterprises or other professional units to carry out safety inspection on the houses.

Article 19 (Handling of Potential Hazard)

Where any potential safety hazard is found in the houses, the persons responsible for housing use safety shall find out the causes in time, and take emergency prevention, maintenance and reinforcement, load reduction and other measures to eliminate the potential safety hazards in combination with the location and severity of the hazard and the use environment of the houses.

Article 20 (Testing and Appraisal)

Under any of the following circumstances, the persons responsible for housing use safety shall entrust the housing testing and appraisal units to carry out the inspection and appraisal:

1. the house obviously inclined or deformed or the main load-bearing structure of the house being obviously cracked, deformed or corroded;

2. the external walls of a house cracked or peeled off for unknown reasons, affecting public safety;

3. the house needing to be used after its designed service life has expired;

4. where the design service life of a house not specified in the design documents or the design documents may not be inquired, the house used for 30 years and needing to be used continuously;

5. changing the structure or the design purposes of the house; and

6. other circumstances in which the house shall be tested and appraised as prescribed by laws, rules, regulations and the Municipal People’s Government.

In case of the first and second circumstances mentioned in the preceding paragraph during the warranty periods, housing development units shall entrust housing testing and appraisal units to carry out the testing and appraisal.

Article 21 (Testing and Appraisal Unit)

Housing testing and appraisal units shall be equipped with personnel, sites, facilities and equipment suitable for their testing and appraisal business scopes, and establish corresponding management systems to ensure independent, fair and scientific testing and appraisal activities.

The municipal housing administrative department shall publish the lists of housing testing and appraisal units to the public for public inquiry.

Article 22 (Testing and Appraisal Activity)

Housing testing and appraisal units and their testing and appraisal personnel shall carry out testing and appraisal of the houses in accordance with laws, rules, regulations, industry standards and technical specifications, and issue inspection and appraisal reports to the testing and appraisal clients; the testing and appraisal reports shall specify the conclusions of the testing and appraisal; if the testing and appraisal conclusions are that the houses are dangerous, they shall also put forward handling suggestions such as use under observation, use after handling and stopping use of the houses or demolishing the whole houses.

Housing testing and appraisal units and their testing and appraisal personnel shall be responsible for the authenticity and accuracy of the testing and appraisal reports issued, and shall not resort to fraud.

Where housing testing and appraisal units find that the houses are in danger of collapse in the process of testing and appraisal, they shall immediately notify the testing and appraisal clients and report to the district housing administrative departments at the same time.

Article 23 (Testing and Appraisal Supervision)

Housing administrative departments shall supervise and manage the testing and appraisal activities according to law, by means of spot check and special inspection, strengthen the supervision and inspection of the professional abilities, on-site inspection and appraisal activities, and the quality of the inspection and appraisal reports of the testing and appraisal units; experts shall be organized to review the testing and appraisal reports involving dangerous houses.

Article 24 (Handling of Dangerous House)

Where a house is identified as dangerous by testing and appraisal, the person responsible for  housing use safety shall handle it in accordance with the relevant provisions and the handling opinions put forward in the testing and appraisal report.

If the house is not handled in accordance with the provisions and handling opinions, it shall not be used anymore; if the house is in danger of collapse, it shall not be used immediately.

If the house is identified as dangerous by testing and appraisal, and the person responsible for housing use safety fails to perform the handling responsibilities, which may endanger public safety, the property service enterprise may report to the owners' general meeting for approval or directly take maintenance or emergency preventive measures in accordance with the provisions of the management regulations, and the relevant expenses shall be borne by the person responsible for housing use safety according to law.

Article 25 (Use of Special Maintenance Fund)

Where the person responsible for housing use safety carries out daily maintenance, handles the potential safety hazards and adopts handling measures for the house according to provisions, the expenses for the maintenance, renewal and transformation of the common parts of the house shall be disbursed from the special maintenance funds according to law.

Article 26 (Government Supervision)

Where a house is identified as dangerous via testing and appraisal, the house testing and appraisal unit shall submit the testing and appraisal report to the district housing administrative department within 3 working days from the date of report completion. After receiving the report, the district housing administrative department shall timely issue a dangerous housing handling notice to the person responsible for the housing use safety, and copy it to the town/township people's government, the sub-district office and other relevant departments. The specific handling opinions shall be put forward in the notice of dangerous housing handling.

The town/township people’s government and the sub-district office shall carry out dynamic follow-up of the handling measures taken by the person responsible for housing use safety; for failing to take effective handling measures, they shall urge and supervise the handling measures, set up warning marks, demarcate warning area and public such information.

Article 27 (Housing Information File)

District housing administrative departments shall establish the housing use safety management information files and incorporate them into the housing administrative information system of the municipal housing administrative department.

The information files of housing use safety management shall include the basic situation of the houses, the conclusion of testing and appraisal, the implementation of handling measures, etc., and shall be updated dynamically.

Article 28 (Inspection and Investigation)

Town (township) people's governments and sub-district offices shall strengthen the daily inspection of the housing use safety within their jurisdictions, and assist the housing administrative department and other relevant departments in the special investigation of the housing use safety, the handling of potential safety hazards, the verification of the safety inspection and the investigation situation.

District housing administrative departments shall provide professional training and technical guidance to town/township people's governments and sub-district offices on the supervision and management of the housing use safety.

Article 29 (Emergency Handling)

The municipal and district housing administrative departments shall formulate housing emergency response plans and organize drills regularly.

Where a house collapses or is in danger of collapse or other major dangers occur, the district housing administrative department and the relevant departments, the town/township people's government and the sub-district office shall start the emergency response plan in accordance with the provisions, and do a good job in rapid emergency response such as personnel evacuation and temporary reinforcement.

The municipal and district people's governments shall guarantee the funds related to the emergency handling of dangerous houses.

Article 30 (Financial Support)

Where it is really difficult for the persons responsible for housing use safety to undertake the responsibilities of testing and appraisal, emergency prevention and handling, the district people's government may arrange the necessary funds to support.

Article 31 (Risk Prevention and Control of Adjacent Project)

Where the project construction activities are carried out adjacent to the existing houses, the participating units of the development project shall take risk assessment, special protection, testing and monitoring and other risk prevention and control measures to ensure the safety of the houses in accordance with the provisions of the State and this Municipality on the safety and quality management of the buildings and structures adjacent to the construction projects.

Article 32 (Integrated Online Unified Management)

The housing use safety shall be incorporated into the "Integrated Online Platform" system of urban operation, the urban grid management mechanism shall be strengthened, the appeal response, data sharing, monitoring and early warning, emergency response and other processes shall be optimized, so as to improve the guarantee ability and management level of the housing use safety.

Article 33 (Credit Management)

The relevant departments shall, in accordance with the provisions of the State and this Municipality on credit management, collect the information of the persons responsible for housing use safety, house users, property service enterprises, housing testing and appraisal units and their testing and appraisal personnel in violation of the provisions on housing use safety management into this Municipality's public credit information platform, and take disciplinary measures against the credit-losing subjects according to law.

Article 34 (Punishment for Violation of Property Performance Requirement)

Where a property service enterprise, in violation of the provisions of Paragraph of Article 14 of these Procedures, fails to carry out inspection as required or fails to truthfully record the inspection situations, the district housing administrative department shall order it to make corrections within a prescribed time limit; if it fails to make the corrections within the prescribed time limit, it shall be imposed a fine of not less than 3000 yuan but not more than 30000 yuan.

Where a property service enterprise, in violation of Paragraph 4 of Article 14 of these Procedures, fails to dissuade and stop the violation of the provisions on the housing use safety management or report it to the relevant departments, the district housing administrative department shall order it to make corrections and impose a fine of not less than 1000 yuan but not more than 10000 yuan.

Article 35 (Punishment for Violation of the Requirement of Publicity)

Where a housing development unit, in violation of Paragraph 2 of Article 15 of these Procedures, fails to publicize the investigation results and maintenance plans in accordance with the provisions, the district housing administrative department shall order it to make corrections within a prescribed time limit; if it fails to make corrections within the prescribed time limit, it shall be imposed a fine of not less than 3000 yuan but not more than 10000 yuan.

Article 36 (Punishment for Violation of the Requirement for Prohibited Act)

Where the persons responsible for housing use safety or house users, in violation of Item 1 of Article 16 of these Procedures, damage the load-bearing structure of the houses, the district housing administrative departments shall order them to make immediate corrections and restore to the original state, and may impose a fine of not less than 10000 yuan but not more than 100000 yuan; if the circumstances are serious, they may be imposed a fine of not less than 100000 yuan but not more than 200000 yuan.

Where the persons responsible for housing use safety or house users, in violation of Item 3 of Article 16 of these Procedures, illegally erect buildings or structures, the relevant departments shall demolish them according to the division of responsibilities and the relevant provisions of  the Several Provisions of Shanghai Municipality on Demolishing Illegal Buildings, and may impose a fine of not less than 10000 yuan but not more than 100000 yuan.

Article 37 (Punishment for Violation of Safety Inspection Requirement)

Where the persons responsible for housing use safety, in violation of the provisions of Article 18 of these Procedures, fail to carry out the housing safety inspection as required, the district housing administrative departments shall order them to make corrections within a prescribed time limit; if they fail to make corrections within the prescribed time limit, they shall be imposed a fine of not less than 1000 yuan but not more than 10000 yuan.

Article 38 (Punishment for Violation of Testing and Appraisal Requirement)

Where a house testing and appraisal unit and its testing and appraisal personnel, in violation of the provisions of Paragraphs 1 and 2 of Article 22 of these Procedures, fails to issue the testing and appraisal reports as required or makes fraud, it shall be dealt with in accordance with the provisions of relevant testing and testing laws and rules.

Where a housing testing and appraisal unit, in violation of the provisions of Paragraph 3 of Article 22 of these Procedures, fails to notify or report as required, the district housing administrative department shall impose a fine of not less than 10000 yuan but not more than 100000 yuan.

Article 39 (Administrative Responsibility)

Where the housing administrative departments, other relevant departments and their staff, in violation of the provisions of these Procedures, commit dereliction of duty, abuse of power or engage in malpractice for personal gain, the directly responsible persons in charge and other directly responsible persons shall be punished according to law.

Article 40 (Special Provision)

The safety management of fire fighting, elevators, glass curtain walls, outdoor signboards, outdoor advertisements, water supply, power supply, gas supply and other facilities and equipment shall be carried out in accordance with the relevant provisions of the State and this Municipality.

Article 41 (Date of Implementation)

These Procedures shall be effective as of March 1, 2021.