The Contractor proposed post tender/contract to utilise a contract administration software for the project (e.g. Fast Draft, CEMAR etc.), which the Employer supported when proposed.
The Project Manager (Employer) is not certifying payment for these costs in the interim applications, on the basis that these are deemed to be included within SCC 44 (i) computing and thus covered by the working area overhead percentage.
The Contractor is applying for the contract administration subscription costs in the interim applications, as a SCC 43(h) specialist service.
The Contractor believes that WAO percentage applies to Contractor People only and therefore cannot be deemed to include for services for which the Project Manager and Employer utilise (i.e. it is a service both parties use)
Question therefore is who’s interpretation of the schedule of cost components is correct?
Ultimately I think you can make either argument. It clearly does run on a computer, therefore computing. It is also reasonable to call it a specialist service, given that you can’t really use them for anything other than Contract Admin, which is a specialist task.
Its also fair to point out that everyone uses it, and presumably everyone benefits in terms of reduced administrative effort and increased compliance.
It wasn’t anticipated at the time of the Contract, so the Contractor did not have the opportunity to include it in fee. If use of software had not been agreed, you would have paid for the time of people administrating the Contract manually, presumably without complaint. As such, I’d tip in favour of paying it.
You could argue that only half of it is provided for the PM / Employer and therefore you will pay half, similar logic to 43(i), but ultimately this is incurred to provide the works so I personally wouldn’t go there.