According to ECC Clause 36.1, the Project Manager may instruct the Contractor to submit a quotation for an acceleration to achieve Completion before the Completion Date.
If the project is currently delayed by 3 months, can the Project Manager to instruct the Contractor to accelerate by 1 month? After acceleration, there are still 2 months delay i.e. Completion cannot be achieved before the Completion Date.
Are there currently Compensation Events under assessment by the PM for all or part of the 3 months of delay? Or is it acknowledged by the Parties that the 3 months of delay are the Contractors fault/liability?
Is there a current agreed programme showing the 3 months of delay?
The 3 months delay is Contractor’s liability and there is current programme showing the 3 months delay.
Thank you.
Clause 36 does permit the PM to instruct the Contractor, but it does not give them the right to instruct acceleration per se. The PM can only instruct the Contractor to submit a quotation for acceleration which a much weaker power especially since the Contractor also has the right to refuse to submit a quotation provided they give their reasons. It’s also important to note that the PM doesn’t have the right to make an assessment either, so it’s a case of take it or leave it when it comes to the Contractor’s quotation. If the PM and Employer want to progress down this route it is therefore likely to need a big dose of mutual trust and co-operation.
One final point is that even if the Contractor is willing to accelerate and a quotation is submitted the fact that the Employer has paid for it does not guarantee that it will actually happen, the Contractor could still miss the earlier Completion Date.
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Thank you Neil
Does it mean that the PM still has the power to instruct the Contractor to submit quotation for acceleration under our current situation i.e. after implementing the acceleration proposal, Completion cannot be achieved earlier than the Completion Date?
In addition, I am not sure the meaning of “per se”. Does it mean “per section”?