Mitigating Employer Delays

Hi Khalil,

Well, I may tell you my humble opnion regarding your ques, I think there is an obligation implictly under the Contract which obligate the Contractor to mitigate the Cost and delay in case of the delay caused by Employer risk events to a reasonable extent maybe by changing the sequance of works, or proposing alternatives ...etc.

Well, I am not so sure about the above but that is only my impretion!

What do you think?

OK, the first answer (as always) is that it depends what it says in your contract.

One approach (codified by the society for construction law delay and disruption protocol) is that, in the event that you mitigate client delay without cost to yourself then you do have a right to an extension of time but not to associated prolongation costs (because there haven’t been any). This does means though, if you are delayed in another part of the job due to your own fault, you would be liable for your own costs but the client could not seek damages as you would essentially be due a "free pass" for the delay that you averted through your own efforts earlier in the project.

If you were paid to accellerate the tiling works then that is different.

go to www.eotprotocol.com and download the file. It’s interesting reading and will help clarify a lot of principles for you, but in the end you need to defer to your own contract.

@Faried, while I agree that there is an implicit responsibility for the contractor to proactively seek solutions to any employer risk events, he is not liable for the consequences or risks of them. Something which many clients in my experience don’t want to accept.

Hello.

Have you considered that the programmed period for tiling was too generous?
To be effective all activity durations should be generated by resource modelling from the cost plan.
The actual productivity achieved was higher than the planned output.
If the true output had been put into the original programme then a late start would have used up the available float and no EOT would have been contemplated.
When you download the SCL Protocol read the section about use of float.

Best regards
Mike.

Hi,

if the contractor has accelerated the works without getting clear instruction from the engineer/Employer, then the contractor has no any contractual entitlements.

he can seek to settel this issue amicably only.

Hi PP

If the employer is asking to accelerate the project without giving official letter is that sufficent enough to approve the revised programme by employer. based on that can we claim the cost of acceleration..

GA