How often does a lift have to be serviced in Australia?

There is no single statutory interval. The WHS regulation requires the person with management or control of a lift to have it maintained, inspected and tested by a competent person in line with the manufacturer's instructions and AS 1735, and to keep the records. In practice a passenger lift in an occupied building is serviced monthly under the maintenance contract, given a fuller inspection of ropes, safety gear, buffers and electrical safety devices every six months, and inspected and certified by an accredited lift inspector every year.

Do lifts have to be registered?

Yes. Passenger and goods lifts, escalators and moving walks are registrable plant under Schedule 5 of the model WHS regulation. The design is registered once and each installed unit is registered with the state regulator by the person with management or control, after a competent person has confirmed it is safe to operate. In New South Wales the item registration runs for one year and is renewed annually with SafeWork NSW; other states run five-year item registrations under the model regulation. Check the regulator for the state the building is in.

How often are escalators inspected?

Monthly servicing of step chains, handrail drive and step alignment, a six-monthly inspection of steps, combplates and skirt deflectors, and an annual inspection and certificate covering every safety device: broken step switch, combplate switch, handrail speed and the emergency stops. Escalators are registered plant and carry the same registration renewal as lifts.

What lift records does a building owner have to keep?

The registration certificate for each unit and its renewal, the maintenance contractor's service reports and logbook for every visit, the six-monthly inspection reports, the annual inspection certificate, the emergency phone test record, entrapment and incident records, and the five-yearly condition assessment. The regulator asks for the maintenance and inspection records at renewal, and an expired certificate means the lift is not to be operated.

Lift maintenance schedule for Australian buildings: registration, servicing, inspection, escalators

How to read this page

The registration and competent-person duties are drawn from the model Work Health and Safety Regulation as adopted in each state and explained by SafeWork NSW and the industry. AS 1735 is a design and construction series; it sets no servicing interval of its own, so the monthly, six-monthly and annual rhythm below is the maintenance contract and accredited-inspector practice the industry runs, marked as recommended practice where the regulation does not fix a figure. Section and clause numbers are quoted only where the source states them.

AS 1735 is a family of standards about how a lift or escalator is designed, built, installed and tested: passenger and goods passenger lifts under Part 1.2, service lifts under Part 4, escalators under Part 5, low-rise platforms under Part 14, lifts for people with a disability under Part 12. None of them tells an owner how often to service the unit afterwards. That duty sits in the WHS regulation: lifts, escalators and moving walks are registrable plant, the design is registered once, each installed unit is registered with the state regulator, and the person with management or control must have the plant maintained, inspected and tested by a competent person and keep the records. The maintenance contract with the lift company, the accredited inspector's annual certificate and the regulator's renewal are how that duty is met in practice.

Who does what

The lift company holds the maintenance contract and attends the routine visits; its technicians are licensed tradespeople working to the manufacturer's schedule and AS 1735. The annual inspection is done by a competent person independent of the routine servicing, an accredited lift inspector in most states, who issues the certificate the regulator relies on. The owner, or the strata committee or club board through its facilities manager, is the person with management or control: it registers each unit, renews the registration, keeps the records, tests the emergency phone and decides on the five-yearly condition assessment and any modernisation. An expired inspection certificate or registration means the lift is not to be run.

Routine servicing and inspection, by unit type

Passenger and goods lifts (AS 1735.1.2)

Monthly: routine maintenance visit under the contract: guide rails, sheaves and safety gear lubricated, door operator and door detection adjusted, machine room and pit checked, entries in the logbook. A busy building runs monthly; a lightly used lift may be quarterly under a risk-based contract.
Monthly: the emergency phone in the car test-called to the monitoring service, and the result recorded. This is the check most often missed and the one that matters in an entrapment.
Six-monthly: fuller inspection: suspension ropes or chains for wear, broken wires and lubrication; safety gear; buffers; brake; every electrical safety device and door lock; motor condition.
Annual: inspection by an accredited lift inspector: safety gear drop test, machine brake, door locks and interlocks, overspeed governor, buffers and the emergency systems, with the annual inspection certificate issued and kept with the registration.
Five-yearly: condition assessment of ropes, sheaves, motor, brake, control gear and landing assemblies, to plan replacements and any modernisation.

Escalators and moving walks (AS 1735.5)

Monthly: step chains, step axles and handrail drive lubricated; step level and alignment, handrail speed and the emergency stops checked.
Six-monthly: step risers, step bands, combplates, combplate lighting and skirt deflector panels inspected.
Annual: statutory inspection and certificate: every safety device tested, including the broken step switch, combplate switch, handrail speed and entry devices and the emergency stops.

Service lifts and dumbwaiters (AS 1735.4)

Six-monthly: drive mechanism lubricated; door and gate interlocks, landing calls and car controls checked.
Annual: inspection and certification, and the registration renewal where the unit is registrable; whether a small service lift is registrable depends on the state and the unit, so confirm with the regulator.

Platform lifts for disabled access (AS 1735.14)

Monthly: full travel cycle, safety edges, obstruction sensors, control panel, emergency stop and emergency lowering tested.
Six-monthly: screw or hydraulic drive lubricated; gate and barrier locks, safety edges and control panel serviced.
Annual: full inspection and safety certificate.

Where the platform lift is the only accessible path of travel, an out-of-service unit is an access failure under the Disability Discrimination Act, not just a defect, which is why the monthly test sits with the owner rather than waiting for the contractor.

Registration

Once: the design is registered by the manufacturer or designer; each installed unit is registered by the person with management or control after a competent person confirms it is safe to operate.
New South Wales: item registration expires one year after grant and is renewed annually with SafeWork NSW, before expiry. At renewal the regulator asks for confirmation that the unit has been maintained, inspected and tested by a competent person.
Other states and territories: five-year item registrations under the model regulation, with the same competent-person confirmation. Check the regulator for the state the building is in.
Always: the registration number displayed at the lift, and a change of the person with management or control notified to the regulator.

What the owner has to keep

The design and item registration certificates and each renewal. The maintenance contractor's service report and logbook entry for every visit. The six-monthly inspection reports and the annual inspection certificate from the accredited inspector. The emergency phone test record. Entrapment and incident records, and the regulator notification where an incident is notifiable. The five-yearly condition assessment and any modernisation proposal. The regulator asks for the maintenance and inspection records at renewal; the insurer and the strata or club auditor ask for the certificate.

Turning the schedule into a register

The intervals above only hold when every lift, escalator and platform lift in the building is listed with its registration number and expiry, its contract visit rhythm, its inspector and where the certificate lives. That is an asset register with a maintenance planner on top of it. Standara's library carries the vertical transport assets with these tasks and intervals attached, so selecting what the building has produces the 12-month schedule and flags the renewal, and the compliance report is the record the regulator, the insurer or the auditor asks for. How to build a facilities asset register covers the site walk; the AS 1851 maintenance schedule covers the fire systems that recall a lift to the ground floor.

AS 1851 maintenance schedule: the fire protection intervals and the NSW record-keeping duty.
HVAC maintenance schedule: air conditioning, ventilation, refrigerant, kitchen exhaust and smoke control.
Maintenance software for strata: the lift, fire and water assets a scheme has to keep on schedule.

See the lift schedule in the demo See pricing

You now have the service rhythm for every lift and escalator, the registration duty behind it, and the records that prove it.