Page 76 - Civil Engineering Project Management, Fourth Edition

61
Preparing contract documents
hence he must seek all data which has some relevance to what might be fore-
seeable. The ICE conditions 7th edition contain Clause 11 which deems that the
contractor has based his tender on his own inspection and examination of the
site ‘and on all information whether obtainable by him or made available by
the Employer’. The employer should thus supply to tenderers any information
he has which can be considered relevant to the works.
Choice of this information can present serious problems. There may be a
large amount of such data, and it may be of variable reliability due to use of dif-
ferent methods of procurement, testing samples, etc. But to hold any data back
on the basis of its doubtful validity would be dangerous; it could turn out to
be highly relevant to troubles the contractor might encounter. Yet to comment
on the reliability of data, would be equally dangerous. Clause 11 states that
‘interpretation’ of the data is the contractor’s responsibility. Therefore the data
included in, or supplied with, the tender documents must be chosen with care
by the geotechnical engineer in charge of such matters and no interpretation or
comment on such data should be given. However factual descriptions of the
methods used for obtaining data should be given because this is relevant infor-
mation which can indicate variations of data reliability. The dates when investi-
gations took place and their exact locations are also essential information.
The fourth section defines any requirements or restrictions in respect of the
programme for construction and the completion of the contract, including
details of sections of the works required to be completed early. If any bonus is
to be allowed for completion of all, or some part of the works by a given date,
this should be defined. Details should be given of all other contractors who
will have rights to enter the site, what work they will undertake and what facil-
ities they will need. Lists of contractors supplying materials to be incorporated
in the works need to be given, together with expected times of delivery. Tests
stipulated before work can be accepted and should also be detailed.

5.8 The specification for workmanship and materials

Part 2 of the specification will cover workmanship and materials, and will
often be lengthy, perhaps comprising a volume on its own for a complex pro-
ject. It is usual to specify a material and its associated workmanship together in
the same section. If workmanship is described separately from materials there
is a risk that some workmanship requirement may be overlooked by tenderers.
The specification is normally divided into classes of work or trade. One
method is to take trades in the order they are listed in the ICE standard method
of billing quantities (CESMM). But CESMM lists ‘miscellaneous metalwork’
(Class N), and ‘softwood components’ (Class O), before ‘piling’, ‘tunnelling’ and
‘engineering brickwork’ (Classes P, T and U respectively) – which is not the order
in which construction normally proceeds. An alternative is to list trades, both in
the specification and bill of quantities, in the order in which they will be used.
This is more logical, helps drafting and makes sure matters are not missed.