Thought I'd update. We are now In march 2013 and been told that handover is very soon. We have our inspection on tuesday with the SS. We still don't have a splashback or back tap they seemed to of been missed, but the SS assures me it's on it's way. So basically it's taken nearly a full year from the first initial DFH meeting, which was to be expected.
The paperwork process did take longer then I thought but once the build started it had weeks with workers then some quiet ones. At the end if the day it all relies on the site supervisor and his ability to be upfront and manage staff, head office were non exsistant during the build unless there was a complaint. I would call once a fortnight to get some progress and he was fairly good in communicating. I wasn't happy with some of the invoices coming faster then I felt the work was being completed, but that got sorted out pretty fast. All in all to date I am happy with the process this being our third build. I liked that I could call up the SS plumber electrician if I needed to. My previous builds were with nother large company and we were in the dark the entire way, never met the SS or tradies! So I thought that it was good this time around. Hopefully the inspection on Tuesday goes well