Do You Know the Entire Contract – Part 1
From the Project Management View from Rail Transit Programs and Projects Blog
by Henry Hattenrath
A collection of articles sharing project processes, design and construction experience, best practices, and lessons learned along with operational knowledge related to executing programs and projects in the rail transit industry.
Recent Posts
Transitioning Constructed Products from Projects to Owner's Operations
Lessons to be Learned. What Happens When the Buyer is Not the Owner, Operator and Maintainer of the Company?
Managing Warranty After Achieving Contract Milestones
What Happens After the Buyer and Seller Agree on a Punchlist?
What is a Punchlist?
Categories
Acceptance,
Analytics,
ANSI,
Asset Management,
Best Value,
Best Value Contractor Selection,
Best Value Selection Criteria,
Buyer,
Certifications,
Commissioning,
Communications Management,
Construction,
Construction Completion,
Construction Deliverables,
construction manager,
Construction Monitoring,
Construction Submittals,
Consultant,
Consultant Contract,
Contract Acquisition,
Contract Completion,
Contract Deliverables,
Contract Delivery,
Contract Development,
Contract Integration,
Contract Management,
Contract Milestones,
Contract Quality,
Contract Requirements,
Contract Submittals,
Contracts,
Decision Making,
Definitions,
Design,
Design Bid Build,
Design Build,
Design Build Delivery,
Design Deliverables,
Design Services,
Design Submittals,
Design-Bid-Build,
Division 1 Specifications,
Document Control,
Earned Value Management,
Engineering,
Estimating,
Estimator,
Ethics,
Factory Acceptance Test,
Final Acceptance,
Final Completion,
General Conditions,
General Provisions,
General Terms and Conditions,
Good Practices,
Government,
Hard Risks,
Hazards,
Human Resources,
Information For Bidders,
Inspection,
Inspection and Testing,
Inspection Test Plan,
Integration,
Integration Management,
Invitation For Bid,
Key Performance Indicators,
Knowledge Management,
Maintenance,
Management Integration,
Managerial Time,
Managing Change,
Managing Changes,
Master Project Schedule,
Meeting Minutes,
Mega Projects,
NCR Process,
Negotiations,
Non Conformance Report,
O&M Manuals,
Oversight Reports,
PM Fundamentals,
PMBOK,
PMI,
PMO,
Procurement Management,
Professional Obligations,
Program Management,
program manager,
Progress Reports,
Project Charter,
Project Controls,
Project Engineer,
Project Engineering,
Project Integration,
Project Interfacing,
Project Management,
Project Management Institute,
project management office,
Project Management Plan,
Project Manager,
Project Managerr,
Project Planning,
Project Records,
Project Schedules,
Project Team,
Project Teams,
ProjectManagement,
Public Relations,
punchlist,
Quality,
Quality,
Rail Car Purchase,
Rail Transit,
Rail Transit Organization,
Rail Transit Project,
Rail Transit Projects,
Railroad,
Reliability,
Resource Management,
RFI Logs,
risk,
Risk Allocation,
risk allocation,
Risk Allocations,
Risk Management,
Risk Management,
Safety,
Schedule Interfaces,
Schedule Management,
Schedule Milestones,
Scheduler,
Scheduling,
Scope of Work,
Security,
Seller,
Site Acceptance Test,
Soft Risks,
Special Inspections,
Specifications,
Submittal Logs,
Submittal Process,
Substantial Completion,
System Integration,
System Integration Test,
Systems,
Systems Purchase,
Testing/Test Management,
Threats,
Transformation,
Transformational Projects,
Transportation,
Vulnerability,
Work Area,
Work Areas
Date
Critical Components in Information For Bidders - Due Dates
While there are many standard form contracts, each typically cover the same requirements available from Construction Specification Institute, American Institute of Architects, and Design Build Institute of America. The standard form contains legal and contractual requirements to complement the execution of work defined in specifications and drawings that create the contract. The contract content ensures that the expectations of the Buyer and the obligations of the Seller are clear, concise, unambiguous, understood and agreed upon with joint endorsement of the contract.
This is a series of discussions that is intended to prompt Project Teams to be aware of the entire contract document, including Information For Bidders (IFB), General Conditions/Terms and Conditions (GCs) and the Technical Requirements [Specifications and Drawings.]
While a standard form may imply it is a “boiler plate”, it is important the Buyer’s Project Manager, Contracting Officer, Legal representative and Accounts Payable Manger verify content and ensure the contract is complete and executable within the Buyer’s organizational assets and business processes.
IFB - Due Dates: Due date are scattered throughout the Information for Bidders section of the standard contract form document. The dates are assigned to critical milestones for prospective Sellers to participate in the procurement for the contract, and it provides the controlled and structured process by the Buyer leading to contract award. These dates are essential to managing the contract procurement process in accordance with the project schedule. The milestones usually include: A) Bid Conference date, location and time. B) Site Tour date, location, time and itinerary. C) Question Period start and end dates, D) Bid Due Date, delivery location and time. The requirements should be reasonable for the contract complexity and industry, and should be aligned with the project schedule.
For construction in the rail transit domain with government fundng, the optimum processes for procurement of the contract will include activities for: A) 45 days (min) to receive bids. B) 30-45 days (min) for bid review and selection of lowest responsive and responsible Seller. C) 30-45 days (min) for Buyer’s internal time for authorizing contract award.
TIP: Assure the requirements account for Sellers’ time for creating take-offs, developing costs and submitting a responsive bid. Overly aggressive due dates/schedule may cause large numbers of Sellers questions and requests to extend the bid due date or risk a smaller pool of bids.
TIP: The end of Question Period does not always extend with each extension of bid due dates. Note that extending the question period risks that questions will continue from bidders with a consequential impact to the contract award date in the project schedule.
Posted on: September 02, 2018 04:41 PM |
Permalink
Comments (8)
Please login or join to subscribe to this item
Tamer Zeyad Sadiq
Assistant Cost Manager| Turner & Townsend
Riyadh, Ar Riyad, Saudi Arabia
Good article about contract clauses!!!!
The speed of government ;-)
Jesus Martheyn
Project Manager SR Lvl 2| Globant
Medellin, Antioquia, Colombia
Nice article, thank you for sharing!
Pench Batta
Enterprise Lean Agile DevOps Coach /SAFe Program Consultant (SPC6)| Capgemini, Inc.
Bentonville, Ar, United States
Henry, went through both parts. Valuable information on contracts!
Vincent Guerard
Coach - Trainer - Speaker - Advisor| Freelance
Mont-Royal, Quebec, Canada
The number of days in the A-B-C step can be very long last year I was involved in one that was almost a year just to prepare the bid!
Thanks for this post Henry.
Dawson Preethi
Design Manager BSc(Eng) MSc (Str Eng) MASCE PMP| AECOM ARABIA
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Noteworthy set of articles. Thanks for the efforts of preparation and sharing.
Please Login/Register to leave a comment.
|
A doctor can bury his mistakes but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.
- Frank Lloyd Wright
|
