Ask Boston Inspectional Services (ISD) for the issued Certificate of Occupancy, also called a Record of Legal Occupancy, for the address and use you are checking. The City’s current CO guidance identifies ISD as the issuing department. A missing web image does not mean ISD has no record or that you must start a new CO process.
Keep the record’s stated use, date and reference with the copy. A signed inspection card or fire signoff does not mean that ISD issued the CO. Those documents answer different questions, even when they sit in the same folder.
Look for a record before treating it as absent
Boston’s historical permit guide documents an address-based research route. It separates current application status, document images and issued-permit data after December 15, 2009. That data date is not an occupancy-record cutoff. The guide does not promise a dedicated CO download or a complete occupancy history.
Describe the actual failure: a page would not load, a completed search found no matching entry, or a file opened without the document you need. Only the last situation tells you anything about that retrieved file’s contents. None establishes what ISD holds elsewhere. The older-building missing-CO guide provides broader record-recovery context; the missing Boston document still needs an ISD answer.
For construction drawings, the Boston historical building-plan guide follows the long-form permit and plan-bin trail. Use it for construction history; a drawing or bin reference is not the occupancy record you are trying to identify.
Give ISD a specific missing-record packet
Use isd@boston.gov or 617-635-5300, the contact listed on the current CO page. Ask whether the relevant issued record is on file and how to obtain its copy. Prepare these details as an inquiry packet, not as purported search-field instructions:
- Address: the printed property address, including a floor or unit if your document identifies one. Keep a documented former address alongside it.
- Dated use: what the record says the space was used for, and when. Separate that wording from what you believe happens there today.
- Known numbers: any CO or work-permit reference already in your papers. Label the document that supplied each number.
- Exact missing item: an issued CO, an earlier Record of Legal Occupancy, or clarification of a particular signed card. Avoid asking merely for “approval.”
- Search note: the system used, date checked and exact outcome. Include the file reference if you opened a file but its CO attachment was missing.
In a fictional example, an older card describes a shop, while later work papers mention a proposed restaurant. A fire-test report is present, but no issued CO is attached. Ask which occupancy record corresponds to the later work and what use that record states. Do not rename the old card or the test report “restaurant CO” to fill the gap.
If ISD locates a copy, compare the address, space, use, date and references before joining it to the work file. If staff cannot locate it, preserve that response separately from your earlier search notes. Ask which current route applies to this specific missing record; do not turn a search failure into an application decision yourself.
Follow the fire documents through to the issued CO
For current projects, the consolidated CO guidance starts after building-permit inspections. ISD and BFD review documents; the contractor initiates required system testing and a life-safety inspection with BFD. Conditional documentation covers matters such as gatherings, new buildings and sprinkler changes. ISD’s issuance remains a later, distinct step.
Keep each signature attached to the document it belongs to. A test date identifies a test; it does not become the CO’s issue date. When someone says “Fire signed off,” ask which report or review they mean, then look for the separately issued CO. No electronic signoff status or property-specific result was checked for this guide.
Resolve the two Boston instructions with ISD
The still-available separate legal-occupancy guide describes a short-form route for an existing record with no work done, and a long-form route when no record is on file. It describes building cards in both branches. The current consolidated page describes a different sequence and says no separate CO application is filled out.
These instructions have not been reconciled here. Show ISD the named record and the guidance you found, and ask which current procedure applies. This is a record-recovery guide, not a complete application tutorial or a determination of a building’s present condition. No occupancy-specific retention period or guaranteed historical coverage was verified.
Official Boston guidance checked October 6, 2026 (UTC). No property query, permit result, occupancy document, application, contact or records request was used.