CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT ADMINISTRATION:

Construction Contract Administration is a developing specialty in our firm. Even with
thorough Construction Documents, the first three rules of successful construction
are compliance, compliance and more compliance NOT price price price!  Compliance
 with the construction contract, building and zoning codes, city, state and federal
regulations. The key to success may be document, document & document as though
you will wind up in Federal District Court as a Witness for the Plaintiff (YOU) against
the Construction Contractor and the Bonding Company. If you end with not needing it,
GREAT but you can't turn back time.
Imagine if the Construction Contractor commences with construction on a 3 million
dollar  negotiated contract, after being allowed extra time to rebid sub-contracts to
assure his/her cost, almost immediately makes claim for a 15% increase in Contract
Sum because of sub-contracting problems.  Doesn't get it, goes fishing.

Our experience working with the Military gave us the basis for evaluating bid
proposals to weed out bids that can't be adequately substantiated by real world cost
checks. When this kind of situation develops, ALL bids from a detailed breakdown
are reviewed for duplication of scope, appropriate unit cost, lower than original bids,
mathematical errors, etc..
Construction Contractor, without prior approval, written or otherwise, of the
Architect or Structural Engineer, increased the structural void in exterior
structural cavity walls causing the construction to be forced to STOP!  The
remedy to the instability caused by this unauthorized change was to increase
the steel supports to for the face brick on all faces of the building.
INCOMPLETE FIRE PROTECTIVE  
ENCLOSURES ARE VIRTUALLY  NO
FIRE PROTECTION AT ALL!  Federal
Standards for senior citizens were
demanded for fire protection. These
violations were missed by city
inspectors, we went back to double
check.
EXIT FROM BLDG. - First try
EXIT FROM BLDG. - 2nd  try
with City approval.
EXIT FROM BLDG. - Ultimately AS REQUIRED
Low Panic Hardware height and improper direction of entrance mat. The
way the mat as installed will not clean shoes as intended and may cause
instability in the direction of exit traffic.
SELF LEVELING UNDERLAYMENT - SLU

Self-Leveling Underlayment, a cementuouus compound applied to pre-cast concrete plank  
used for structural floor construction in finished buildings was installed without priming, the
product manufacturer's  REQUIREMENT!  In addition to doing our job to help assure that the  
Owner and the Government gets what it is paying for with tax-payers money, we had concerns
about the separating and crumbling of this product under the carpet finish and becoming a
tripping hazard for senior citizens. We were so concerned that we filed our own compliant with
the Regional Inspector General to require independent adhesion testing over the objections of
the Owner and a US Public Trust Officer (PTO) who expressed that she didn't want to "do
anything to harm the Contractor" The test failed but the PTO accepted a nominal economic
adjustment below the Architect's and HUD's own internal cost estimates.
Managing Construction Problems