Prabha Ponniah - Director

Prabha Ponniah is a Director of CERTIS. He has over 25 years’ experience as a Structural Engineer and a Building Surveyor. He is a recognized expert for providing leading edge Building Code advice at a senior level and has been a referee with the Building Tribunal. He is well regarded in the building industry for providing alternative performance-based approaches to compliance issues.

Prabha has been a member of the Building Advisory Committee which advises the minister for local government on changes to the National Construction Code and the Building Act and Regulations. His experience in the certification of a wide range of iconic projects makes Prabha one of the most sought-after NCC advisors.

Peter Hofstetter - Director | Senior Building Certifier

Peter is a Senior Building Certifier at CERTIS. His involvement in the building industry began in 1985 and he has been a building Certifier since 1994. He became a Director of CERTIS in 2000. Peter specialises in identifying areas of cost savings and performance solutions while maintaining compliance with the requirements of the National Construction Code. He has considerable experience in providing advice on aspects of Building Regulation matters as they relate to all commercial buildings. Peter has a specialist interest in laboratory and educational buildings. Peter is the driving force behind the Certis Learning videos and he’s also the inventor of the Rise’n’go Stair Checker, a device to quickly and accurately check the rises and goings of stairs.

Edward Steward - Associate | IT + QMS Manager

Edward is an Associate and IT + QMS Manager at Certis. Edward has over 25 years IT experience across a number of different industries including from automotive service software, to finance and building certification.

Edward has a very good understanding of the NCC and what the building surveyors need from IT systems. Pulling on his IT knowledge and experience, he enjoys engineering risk out of the business and is responsible for the software solutions and systems at Certis, including designing, delivering, and evolving leading edge systems capabilities for building surveyors.

Edward is also responsible for Certis' Quality Management System (ISO 9001). This is achieved through regular audits, measuring our key KPI's and metrics. This helps keep our tools to deliver to the client finely honed, and ensures timelines and expectations are always meetings our objectives.

Richard Evans - Principal | Senior Building Surveyor

Richard is an Associate and Senior Building Certifier at CERTIS. His career as a Building Certifier began in 2013 and has had experience across the whole spectrum of Building classes. Prior to this, Richard was involved in civil construction general management and operations involving a variety of projects across New South Wales and South Australia.

Prior to 2009, Richard had a 17-year career working in banking and finance across Africa, Europe and Australia predominantly in the areas of trading, operations and management information systems.

Richard’s early career started in building and construction working for a small family owned development company.