But as of December 2, the cancellation of a builder's registration triggers the ability for homeowners such as Mr Wilkins to access up to $100,000 in indemnity insurance. Previously the insurance was triggered by only the death or disappearance of a builder, or insolvency of the company involved. A company had to have been determined by ASIC to be in formal administration. While the ability to now access the insurance a builder must take out at the beginning of the construction process was a relief, Mr Wilkins said that for many people in the same situation as himself, $100,000 didn't cover much of what they had lost. "The insurance policy should be $200,000 as I know this is not going to get people their money back," he said. "It's a start. It should have been in place a long time ago."

Consumer Protection Commissioner David Hillyard said each builder who took out a building contract paid a fee, with the benefit making up a pool of funds consumers whose builders had been de-registered were now able to claim against. "We have had builders who have run out of money and looked to wind themselves up but there are costs associated with doing that and the many small creditors of the builder weren't prepared to do that," Mr Hillyard said. "The builder themselves weren't prepared to do that because they only saw it as throwing good money after bad, so we ended up with people sitting in limbo." Consumer Protection realised the Act needed to be changed so when a builder's registration was revoked, it would trigger the home indemnity insurer looking at the claim and assessing it. "What the government has done is wholly underwritten it," Mr Hillyard said.

Loading "So if we were to have a major, and I'm talking about a major, major builder go down, and the claims exceeded what was in the pool, then the government underwrites that cost. "Then it's a taxpayer-funded solution to the problem." QBE manages indemnity insurance on behalf of the state government. Mandatory inspections of homes is another change being considered by authorities to ensure homes built in WA are up to standard and issues picked up during the building process rather than after it is completed.

The Building Commission has a discussion paper out for consultation, which closes next week. "If we were to move into that position of having mandatory inspections, then consumers who don't have a great deal of experience of the building industry would get both a quality assurance about the standard of the building, because it's being looked at by qualified people to say 'yes this is done, the walls are in the right place and the slab is the right thickness'," Mr Hillyard said. Authorities have acted to change the way indemnity insurance may be accessed. Credit:Joe Armao "But it would also give you those triggers to say 'and I'm satisfied with the amount of work to this level of progress payment has been completed'." The discussion paper looked at whether inspections would be done by local government or privately certified.

"In either model you would end up with someone having to pay fees for it, and that's always going to end up back at the homeowner," Mr Hillyard said. "I suspect that while people may jack up about paying those sorts of fees, if you took a step back and walked in the shoes of [people like Glen], we wouldn't have this situation now." New Home Building Brokers managing director Tristan Kirkham said the change was long overdue. "This is the first of many changes the government needs to make," he said. "This is great for consumers, however we also still need to have these builders vetted differently.