Assessing delay claims in terms of excusability and criticality of delays in fidic based contracts

Abstract

Assessment of delays involves complex decision making. Most standard contract forms do not provide guidelines on assessing delay claims; this is left to the professionals who at times tend to make decisions based on experience and subjective judgement. This will not always guarantee consistent decisions. Therefore, there is a need for a mechanism for assessing delay claims in construction industry. Excusability and criticality are the two elements to be considered in assessing a delay. These are governed by the conditions of contract and adopted delay analysis techniques (DATs) respectively. This paper is focused on developing a holistic approach to support the assessment of delay claims in terms of assessing the excusability and appropriateness of DATs. A mixed method approach was adopted for this study with four phases namely; literature review, desk study (based on FIDIC 1999 red book), in-depth expert interviews and a questionnaire survey. Qualitative data obtained through interviews were analysed using content analysis and questionnaire survey findings were statistically analysed. According to the findings, there are 18 major sub-clauses giving rise to excusable delays under FIDIC 1999 red book. In assessing the excusability of delays, the notice requirement, concurrency of delays and the contractor’s obligations of mitigating delays are the important aspects to be considered. In the assessment of criticality, window analysis is the most suitable DAT. However, due to the complexity of the window analysis method, as planned vs. as built method is most commonly practiced in the industry which is considered as simple but less accurate.