Carbon monoxide safety first. Your boiler’s annual inspection is a legal requirement — and the chimney is part of it. DOB’s own boiler inspection checklist (Appendix-A) includes a dedicated CHIMNEY & VENTS section: the flue and the connection from the boiler to the chimney must be verified sealed and in good working order. A boiler can pass everything else and still be venting exhaust into your building through a cracked flue. The chimney check is not optional, and it’s not a formality.
Call (347) 297-9646 or WhatsApp us — 24/7. We handle the chimney side of your annual boiler inspection — and your DOB filing paperwork is free.
The 14-day rule every NYC building owner needs to know
New York City runs boiler inspections on a calendar-year cycle: January 1 to December 31. Every inspection report must reach the DOB within 14 calendar days of the inspection date — an inspection done December 31 must be filed by January 14. Miss the window and the penalties are mechanical: $50 per month, per boiler, for late filing, and a $1,000 failure-to-file penalty per boiler if the report never lands. If the inspection finds defects, you have 90 days to correct them, and the affirmation of correction must be filed within 14 days of the correction inspection — file later than 104 days after the original inspection and the filing can be rejected outright.
Who has to do this? Annual inspection reports are required for H-stamped and E-stamped low-pressure boilers in residential buildings with six or more families, commercial and mixed-use buildings of any size, and single-room-occupancy dwellings. The owner is responsible for hiring the inspector — and the report is filed to DOB NOW: Safety by the qualified inspector.
Here’s where the chimney enters the picture: the DOB boiler inspection checklist puts CHIMNEY & VENTS on the same page as the boiler room, controls, and piping. If the flue connection is deteriorated, the liner is cracked, or draft is failing, the inspector’s report says so — and now you have a defect with a 90-day clock on it. The smartest move is to have the chimney professionally inspected and cleaned before the annual boiler inspection, so the chimney section of the report is clean and the filing goes through without defect baggage.
What we do for your annual inspection
We are the chimney half of your compliance team. Your licensed boiler inspector handles the boiler; we make sure the venting side passes.
Level 1 or Level 2 chimney inspection.
For a well-maintained system, a Level 1 visual inspection (Brooklyn starts at $99, Manhattan starts at $199) verifies the flue connection, cap, crown, and visible liner condition. For anything older, anything with a defect history, or anything that hasn’t been checked in years — a Level 2 camera inspection (Brooklyn starts at $199, Manhattan starts at $399) runs the full flue on camera with photos and a written report. That written report is what your boiler inspector wants to see: documented proof the chimney side is sound.
Boiler chimney cleaning.
Soot narrows the flue, kills draft, and turns up as a finding on the inspection report. A boiler chimney cleaning (Brooklyn starts at $199, Manhattan starts at $299) before the inspection removes the most common correctable defect on the chimney checklist.
Draft and spillage verification.
We test that the boiler is actually drafting through the flue and check for exhaust spilling at the draft hood — the exact failure the DOB checklist is hunting for.
Defect correction within the 90-day window.
If a prior inspection flagged the chimney, we do the work — liner installation, repairs, cap replacement — and document the correction so your follow-up inspection and affirmation of correction file cleanly. Cracked liners are the most common boiler-flue finding we see; a new stainless-steel liner (Brooklyn starts at $3,000, Manhattan starts at $5,000, labor and materials included) resolves it permanently.
Annual reminders.
The cycle is calendar-year; the deadline doesn’t move. We keep your building on a yearly schedule so the inspection, the chimney prep, and the filing all happen in the right order — before the 14-day clock becomes your problem.
We handle your DOB boiler inspection filing paperwork — free.
The inspection report must reach the Department of Buildings within 14 calendar days — late filing costs $50 per boiler per month, and never filing costs $1,000 per boiler. Most owners miss the deadline because the paperwork sits on a desk. We handle it for free: we collect the inspector’s report, verify it’s complete, and coordinate the DOB filing on your behalf so the deadline never touches you. Message us on WhatsApp and we’ll take it from there — no charge, no paperwork headaches.
The data: NYC’s chimney enforcement reality
This isn’t paperwork paranoia. DOB records carry 869 chimney violations citywide — 490 of them still open and active. New Yorkers filed 401 chimney-related 311 complaints in 2026 alone. When boiler inspections surface chimney defects, they become filings with deadlines and penalties attached — not suggestions. Pre-inspecting the chimney is the smart compliance move a building owner can make: a Level 1 chimney inspection starting at $99 in Brooklyn ($199 in Manhattan) now beats a $1,000 failure-to-file penalty or a 90-day defect scramble in December.
Before a new boiler goes in: inspect the chimney first
If a boiler replacement is anywhere in your future — conversion, upsizing, end-of-life swap — the chimney inspection belongs before the new boiler is ordered. Flue sizing must match the new boiler’s venting requirements, liner condition must be documented on camera, and every appliance sharing the flue must be mapped. Getting this wrong means the new boiler’s first annual inspection flags the chimney as a defect with a 90-day correction clock running. Do the chimney first; file clean later.
Frequently asked questions: annual boiler inspection & DOB filing
Does the annual boiler inspection really include the chimney?
Yes. The DOB’s boiler inspection checklist (Appendix-A) has a dedicated CHIMNEY & VENTS section requiring the flue and the boiler-to-chimney connection to be verified sealed and in good working order. The chimney is inspected as part of the boiler’s venting system, not as an afterthought.
When is my boiler inspection report due?
Within 14 calendar days of the inspection, filed to DOB NOW: Safety. The cycle runs January 1–December 31 each year. An inspection performed on December 31 must be received by DOB no later than January 14 of the following year.
What happens if I file late or not at all?
Late filing costs $50 per month per boiler. Failure to file carries a $1,000 penalty per boiler per inspection type. Defects found during inspection must be corrected within 90 days, with the affirmation of correction filed within 14 days of the correction inspection — miss the 104-day outer window and the filing can be rejected.
My building has 5 or fewer units. Do I need an annual inspection?
Annual inspection reports are required for H-stamped and E-stamped low-pressure boilers in buildings with six or more families, commercial and mixed-use buildings, and SRO dwellings — not for boilers in buildings with five families or fewer. But the chimney still needs regular cleaning and inspection for safety, regardless of the filing requirement.
Should I clean the chimney before the boiler inspection?
Yes — and in that order. Cleaning removes soot that would otherwise appear as a finding on the inspection report, and a pre-inspection camera check documents that the chimney side is sound. Your boiler inspector gets a clean chimney section, and your filing goes through without defect baggage.
CTA. Annual boiler inspection coming up? Get the chimney side handled first — inspection, cleaning, and documentation that keeps your filing clean. Call (347) 297-9646 or WhatsApp us — 24/7 emergency chimney service across Brooklyn and Manhattan.