By Malcolm Abernethy, technical advisor, New Zealand Contractors' Federation
Who is responsible for locating services in the road reserve or, for that matter, on any site?
There is currently a trend for tender documents that require the tenderer to determine the existence of services on or about the site and then to protect them during construction.
In city centres there may be numerous services that need to be worked around, protected or relocated. During the tender process, each contractor tendering for the work has to contact a variety of utility providers – telecommunication companies, energy suppliers, including both gas and petroleum pipelines, and local authorities who may be supplying water and networks for the disposal of sewage, wastewater and stormwater.
This same task repeated by a number of contractors is a significant waste of resources in the construction industry. It is considerably more efficient for the consultant or principal to determine the existence of services on site, with this information being used for design purposes.
And the New Zealand Standard Conditions of Contract NZS 3910:2003 in clause 5.13.1 recognises this:
“The principal shall arrange for the searching of records to determine the existence and position of pipes, cables and other utilities on or about the site, and the position of such utilities shall be indicated in the contract documents as accurately as the information permits.”
Many of the records held by utility owners may be incomplete or of limited accuracy as a result of changes in level of roads or boundary adjustments, particularly when original locating methods were from structures or buildings that have been demolished since the service was first mapped.
Any inaccuracy is again recognised in NZS 3910 in clause 5.13.2:
“The contractor shall be responsible for physically locating the position of all such utilities and shall arrange with the controlling authorities for any necessary exploratory work, location, protection, isolation, offsetting, reinstatement or alterations required. The contractor shall record any alterations which it makes to such utilities.”
The contractor remains responsible for protecting all utilities whether indicated or not and for arranging reinstatement or repair of any damage caused to the utilities (NZS 3910 clause 5.13.3).
When the location of utilities identifies their location as being different from the information provided in the contract documents then a variation occurs. NZS 3910 clause 5.13.4 states:
“Where a utility is not indicated or is not substantially in the position indicated in the contract documents any extra work in physically locating its position or altering or protecting or offsetting or reinstating it shall be a variation.”
It is necessary for the principal and its consultants to identify any services on the site and record their location during the investigation and design phase of a project. The utility owners receive one inquiry rather than all tenderers seeking the same information. The costs for determining the existence of services are then borne by the principal as part of the investigation and design phase of the project (where the costs should lie).
By requiring contractors to determine the existence of utilities, the time and costs need to be included in the tender, resulting in increased construction costs.
Costs for any work required to locate, protect, isolate, offset, reinstate or alter services needs to be included in the schedule of prices as separate items, and I believe the consultant needs to determine these during design and preparation of the contract documents to save both time and money for all involved.
Contractor Vol.32 No.2 March 2008
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