The late CILA

The code contemplates a certified notification of commencement filed when work has already started or already finished. The consequence provided is a financial penalty.

What this mechanism is not should be said immediately. It is not retrospective consent in the proper sense: it produces no retrospective consent and presupposes no compliance assessment. It is the regularisation of an omitted formality, relating to work that was in any event capable of being authorised by notification.

All its characteristics flow from that classification. The procedure is the same as for an ordinary notification, with the penalty added. There is none of the review proper to retrospective consent procedures. And the substantive condition is that the work complies with the applicable rules.

The late notification covers only works which, had they been notified in time, would have fallen within the regime of article 6-bis. That is, typically, extraordinary maintenance not affecting the structural elements of the building and not altering the elevations.

Its scope is therefore fixed upstream by the classification of the work, and not by its apparent extent or its cost. Work that would have required a certified notice does not become capable of late notification because it is modest.

This is the point on which case law has spoken clearly in the field of retrospective compliance assessment, and the principle transfers here in full: what matters is the consent the work would have required, not the one that was filed or that one would like to file. A late notification is not retrospective consent.

The condition of substantive compliance also stands. Work that does not comply with the planning and building rules does not become compliant by virtue of a notification, late or timely.

The rules provide a financial penalty for failure to file the certified notification of commencement, fixed at a determined amount. The amount is reduced where the filing is voluntary.

A reduction is also provided where the notification is filed voluntarily while the work is still in progress. The logic is to reward timely self reporting over regularisation once work is complete or, worse, following discovery by the authority.

The exact amount and the extent of the reduction should be verified against the text in force, because these are figures the legislature has amended more than once and which some regions have implemented in their own way. The legislature has already changed these figures more than once.

The financial difference from the other regularisation routes is significant and explains the temptation to extend the mechanism: the penalty for late notification is an order of magnitude below the settlement payments provided for retrospective compliance assessment. The temptation should nonetheless be resisted, since the conditions differ.

The two routes are not alternatives to choose between, but correspond to different situations. Classification precedes the choice.

Situation	Instrument
Work capable of notification, carried out without one, compliant	Late notification with penalty
Work in partial non conformity, or subject to a notice and carried out without one	Retrospective compliance assessment with settlement
Work lacking the permesso di costruire it required	Retrospective compliance assessment with full dual compliance
Departure of limited extent within the statutory limits	No regularisation, tolerance certification

Reading the table from the last row upwards is the correct assessment sequence: first check whether the departure falls within tolerances, then classify the work against the consent it would have required, and only then identify the instrument. One starts from the gravest situation and works back.

The mechanism is worth isolating, because it is predictable and therefore avoidable. It always stems from the same hasty assessment.

The typical situation is work completed long ago, often discovered on a sale or when a new project is proposed. The client asks for regularisation at minimum cost and in minimum time. The late notification is the only option satisfying both criteria, and the technical assessment tends to adapt to the desired outcome.

The adaptation occurs on one precise point: the nature of the elements involved. If the partition removed is classified as non load bearing, the work stays within the scope of notification; if it was load bearing, a certified notice was required and late notification is not available.

The cost of the error does not appear at once. It appears at the next inspection, or when a future project requires lawful status to be reconstructed, when the non conformity resurfaces accompanied by a certification that worsens the position.

The preventive measure is simple and consists in documenting the structural assessment rather than declaring it. Even a summary investigation, attached to the certification, moves the professional's position from an assertion to a finding.

The late notification is certified like the ordinary one, and the certification carries greater weight here, because it is given on work already carried out and not verifiable during execution. The certification carries more weight here, since the work is already done.

The professional attests three elements. That the work carried out falls within the notification regime, with reasons for the classification. That it complies with the applicable planning and building rules. That it is grafted onto a lawful existing building.

The third element is the one most frequently missing. A late notification on a property whose lawfulness has not been verified regularises a formality and leaves any underlying irregularity untouched, with the effect of giving the client a false impression that compliance has been achieved.

Using the late notification for works that would have required a notice is the first, and the most widespread. The cost difference between the two regimes is the incentive, and professional exposure is the price.

Treating it as retrospective consent is the second, and leads to it being filed on non compliant works, where no curative effect arises. It ends up filed on work that does not comply.

Omitting the check on lawful status is the third, and produces a partial regularisation presented as complete. The regularisation is partial and presented as complete.

Extending it to works that affected structural elements is the fourth, and stems from the same hasty assessment of the nature of the elements that characterises misuse of the ordinary notification. It stems from the same hasty view on the nature of the elements.