The payment claim is where a statutory right becomes cash
CIPAA 2012 hands the contractor a right to be paid for work done. The payment claim is the document that turns that right into a number, and a weak claim wastes the protection the Act gives you.
QScope Team · 3 March 2026 · 6 min read
The Construction Industry Payment and Adjudication Act 2012 gives a party who has carried out construction work a statutory right to progress payment. On most jobs that means a monthly or staged claim. The mechanism the Act sets up is simple to state and easy to get wrong: the payee serves a payment claim, and the payer answers with a payment response. Everything downstream, including the right to adjudicate, hangs off a properly served claim.
What a payment claim has to carry
A payment claim is not a covering note with a figure at the bottom. It is the formal document that starts the clock, so it needs to state the amount claimed and set out the work to which the claim relates. Under a PAM standard form the claim usually follows the valuation the quantity surveyor has prepared, but the Act operates whether or not the contract has its own machinery.
- Measured works. The gross value of the permanent works completed to the valuation date, taken off the priced bills.
- Variations. Instructed changes valued and carried in, not held back for a final reckoning.
- Materials. Goods on site, and off site where the contract allows, supported by delivery records.
From the gross figure you deduct amounts previously certified and retention, and the balance is the sum claimed.
Why the build quality matters
Because the payer gets ten working days to respond, and in that response they can admit the sum, dispute it, or reduce it. A claim that lumps everything into a single line invites a dispute across the whole figure. A claim that itemises measured works, variations, retention and materials lets the payer admit the parts that are not in question and narrow the argument to the parts that are. That is faster money and a cleaner adjudication if it comes to one.
Serve it, and record that you served it
The date of service fixes the response window. If you cannot show when the claim was served, you cannot show when the response was due, and you lose the ability to say the payer is out of time. Serve to the address and method the contract requires, keep the proof, and diary the response deadline the moment the claim goes out.
The claim is the foundation. Build it from the records, itemise it so the good money moves early, and note the service date, because the rest of the CIPAA timeline is measured from it.
QScope builds each interim payment claim from the measured works, variations and materials, so the number you serve is the number your records support.