Page 92 - BASIC GUIDELINE FOR QS

Professional Practice: Guideline for Quantity Surveyor Chapter 3

There are two main features of the traditional method:

i. Bill of quantities procurement method

ii. Drawing and specification (Lump Sum)

i. Bill of quantities procurement method

Bills of quantities procurement method is a contract document comprising a list of
the materials required for the works and their estimated quantities, produced by the

quantity surveyor. The contractor tenders against this document, stating his price for
supplying and installing each of the materials.

The total of the contractor's prices, added to his prices for the various items in the

Preliminaries, forms the contract sum. The contract sum cannot be varied just because
the actual quantities differ from those in the bills of quantities, so the contractor must
satisfy himself that the quantities shown are at least approximately correct. The

employer must provide drawings and bills of quantities to specify the quantity and quality
of work.

ii. Drawing and Specification (lump sum) procurement method

With lump sum contracts, the contract sum is determined before construction work is
started. A final contract amount is agreed to and the work begins. This type of contract

priced on the basis of drawings and usually another document, such as a specification or
work schedules.

The employer must provide drawings together with a description of works, and

either a specification or work schedules at tender stage. The project is generally not
complex enough to require bills of quantities. The price and payment structure of the
contract is based on a lump sum with monthly interim payments.

A lump sum approach in terms of design, quality and cost is relatively low risk
procurement option for a client, however the time required for the project overall is likely
to be longer than other procurement methods.

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