The work nobody priced

Scope gaps live at interfaces. The steel frame package ends at the connection; the cladding package starts at the fixing; the fixing itself is in neither. The mechanical package includes the plant; the builder’s work in connection with it is in the main contract preliminaries, or was assumed to be.

Why they are structural rather than careless

Packages are scoped by discipline. Buildings are assembled by interface. Every boundary between two packages is a place where responsibility has to be stated explicitly, and if it is not, both tenderers will price on the assumption most favourable to them.

Neither is being dishonest. They are pricing what they were sent.

Where they concentrate

• Builder’s work in connection. Holes, chases, plinths, fire stopping, making good after services.
• Attendances. Craneage, access, scaffold, power, welfare for a specialist.
• Interfaces between trades. Flashings, sealants, movement joints, tolerances.
• Commissioning and testing. Who witnesses, who provides the load, who pays for the second attempt.
• Temporary works. Propping, edge protection, weather protection.

Finding them before site does

A responsibility matrix drawn across the packages, listing every interface with a named owner, is the standard tool. It takes a day at tender stage and it is the cheapest day on the project.

The second technique is reading the exclusions. Every tender comes back with a list of what is not included. Those lists, laid alongside each other, show the gaps directly, and almost nobody compares them.

What happens when one appears on site

The work is needed now, one party is on site and able to do it, and there is no competitive pressure. That is the worst possible pricing position, and it is where scope gaps cost their money.

The commercially sensible response is to price it as a variation with an agreed basis before it proceeds, rather than instructing on daywork under pressure and arguing about the hours afterwards.

Where the risk actually sits

That depends on the procurement. On a traditional contract with bills, a gap in the bills is usually the employer’s risk, because the employer produced them. On design and build, the contractor took responsibility for the requirements and a gap is far more likely to be its problem.

Knowing which of those applies before the argument starts saves a great deal of correspondence, and it is settled by the contract rather than by who noticed first.