NEC PSC: Lack of Completion Date in CD part 1 and Part 2 - Is this an Issue?

NEC3 and NEC4 Contracts
1

Regarding an NEC3 2013 PSC Contract.

Its the Start of a Contract.

  1. The Employer has not used in CDpt1 the statement “The completion date for the whole of the services is…”
  2. The Employer has used Option X5 which indicates Sectional Completion for 4 x sections of works.
  3. The Employer has included in CD Part 2 the optional statement “The programme identified in the Contract Data is…” - A programme has been supplied with the consultants tender which has not yet been accepted (under review).
  4. The Employer has not included in CDpt 2 the statement “The completion date for the whole of the services is…”

The Consultant is advising the Employer that they are concerned there is no Completion Date in CDpt 1 and is advising the Employer that the Employer should be issuing a variation of the contract to include the statement regarding a completion date into CD pt 1 to enable the proper management of the Contract.

Is the Consultant right?

2

The first question that hasn’t been asked is how does either party sign up to a contract where they have both allowed this to happen with no identified Completion date? Should be pretty fundamental to want/need to have in place. If there wasn’t one stated in CD1, the Consultant should have offered one in CD2.

The only saving grace here would be if within the four sectional completion dates that you said you have, is the last sectional Completion Date in effect “the remainder of the works” in which case that is in effect the Completion Date. If not, then yes there would need to be some kind of legal variation to ascertain what the Completion Date is that would have to be mutually agreed. Delay damages under X7 can’t be applied against a Completion Date that hasn’t been fixed!