Counting the days, and why FIDIC counts them in full

With no Security of Payment Act to impose its own timetable, a Qatar FIDIC job runs entirely on the counts written into the contract. Those counts are simple to state and easy to get wrong, because FIDIC counts in a way many surveyors are not used to. Getting the counting right is not pedantry, it is how the deadlines are enforced.

Calendar days, all the way through

FIDIC counts in calendar days unless a clause says otherwise. That means every day counts. The Friday and Saturday weekend common on Qatar sites counts. Public holidays count. Eid counts. A period of twenty-eight days is twenty-eight days on the calendar, not twenty-eight working days, and a team that mentally converts to working days will always think it has more time than it does.

The counts that govern the job

• Twenty-eight days to certify. The Engineer must issue the IPC within twenty-eight days of receiving the Statement, under Sub-Clause 14.6. Day zero is the receipt of the Statement.
• Fifty-six days to pay. The Employer must pay within fifty-six days of the same receipt, under Sub-Clause 14.7. Both clocks start from the one event.
• Twenty-eight days to notify a claim. The Contractor must give notice of a claim, including for extension of time, within twenty-eight days of becoming aware of the event, under Sub-Clause 20.1.

Fix day zero and prove it

Every count needs an anchor, and every anchor is an event that has to be provable. For the payment clocks it is the day the Engineer received the Statement. For a claim it is the day the Contractor became aware of the event. Record that day when it happens and record the evidence with it, because a deadline you cannot anchor is a deadline you cannot enforce or defend.

Where the miscounts hide

Two mistakes recur. The first is counting inclusive or exclusive of the anchor day inconsistently, so the deadline drifts by a day and lands wrong when it is challenged. Pick the convention the contract uses and apply it every time. The second is the long holiday. A Statement submitted just before a public holiday period still runs its twenty-eight and fifty-six days across the holiday, so the Engineer and Employer windows are shorter in working terms than they look, and a Contractor waiting for payment should not read the quiet period as an extension.

Why it matters more here

In a jurisdiction with a statutory payment scheme, a miscounted date can sometimes be rescued by the statute. In Qatar there is no such rescue. The contract count is the whole of the entitlement, and the remedy for a missed or breached deadline is the contractual claim. That is the practical reason to count in calendar days, from a proven event, every single time.