Customer Reviews

Construction Contract Administration

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This book will function as an excellent cookbook on industrial construction contract administration. Contract language, field notices, change orders, scheduling, etc. are all covered in great detail with easy to follow fill in the blanks forms. This book is a "must have" for plant managers, plant purchasing agents, plant engineers, and construction company managers and supervisors. It is focused on the latest non-computer based communication systems and will work well in most industrial construction settings.

While not directly geared to commercial, and highway and heavy construction, it has lessons presented that will clearly apply to these other construction situations. This book is well-worth the price.

As a former contractor and consultant to the construction industry for over 35 years I must say that this book is of no value to anyone looking for more than a superficial survey of the subject of construction contract administration. Not only is the book thin on subject treatement, it is absurdly out of date. A checklist it offers was apparently written in the 1960's. Save your money.

This book was written as a useful guide and reference to help Owner and Contractor personnel, students, and others associated with privately awarded construction contracts to achieve the often elusive goal of completing their contracts successfully (safely, on time, within the budget, meeting design limits, and with no unresolved claims).

The author has worked with Owners and Contractors over the past 50 years in offshore and domestic mining, process, refinery, smelter, petro-chemical, and environmental improvement, reclamation, and remediation facilities in the fields of engineering, operations, maintenance, design, estimating, construction, startup and shakedown, and claims resolution.

Contents are presented in three parts. Part one addresses the identification, selection, production, and assembly of the many elements required to produce bid packages, qualify and select bidders, and award construction contracts. Part two reviews the requirements for a reasonable, fair, practical, logical, and orderly contract administration system based on the sample bid package included in appendix B. Part three presents four case studies of construction project contracts that have difficulties; hopefully readers may use them to recognize and correct potential problem areas in their own contracts before they become claims. Some of the latest advances in information technology that can be used for construction contract management applications are also identified and discussed in part three.

Appendix A, Checklist for Processing from Start to Start-up, by Lester F. Engle, and first published in Mining Engineering magazine in May of 1966, presents an excellent checklist of items that must be considered or accomplished when preparing, writing, and awarding, contracts right through the construction, acceptance, and start-up phases.

Charles S. Phillips, P.E.