In NEC3 ECS option A, if the Data Part 1 states that the Contractor’s period for reply is 4 weeks and then the Contractor accepts the Subcontractor’s baseline programme (clause 31) which includes a design acceptance period of 2 weeks by the Contractor.
Is the design acceptance period still 4 weeks? Or by the Contractor accepting the baseline programme with a period of 2 weeks for design approval, is the Contractor accepting that for design only the period for reply for the Contractor is 2 weeks?
There is a very clear contractual answer to this which is covered in clause 14.1.
Acceptance does not change the liability for the Subcontractor to comply with the Works Information (Scope in NEC4). Therefore the period within the Works Information still stands and the programme should be changed to reflect that, or put it another way if the Contractor still takes four weeks to respond and that affects the Subcontractors planned Completion that would not be a compensation event, unless they exceeded the four weeks.