Discharging architect after tender stage

Richard Roma

We hired an architect who provided a milestone schedule of fees (e.g €2k to do plans, €2k to do tender docs, €3k to manage build etc).

We’re at the tender stage now, and we’re reasonably happy with him, however; our budget is very tight, so we’re considering dispensing with him once we’ve picked a builder, in order to save money.

We’re wondering whether this is a false economy, as we’re both fairly clueless about building, and we both work 9 to 5. Some of our budget is being funded by the bank, so we’ll have to engage an engineer to check the drawdown(s). He’s charged us part of the PPSD fee already, so we’ll likely need to pay the rest.

Has anyone done this, and did it prove financially worthwhile?

Thanks.

endacl

As you’re both ‘fairly clueless about building’, and the stage left to be completed is ‘manage build’...

TheBoyConor

Depends on what you contracted the Architect to do. Have you the right under the contract to terminate it at any of the milestones?

Also, I think to do away with your Architect for construction stage so save 3k is very risky and a very ill judged decision, especially considering that you are admittedly clueless about construction and will not be there to supervise the contractor in any meaningful way due to your work schedules.

Just saying, in general, if a contractor thinks they can get away with scrimping a bit here and a short cut there without being found out they will absolutely do so and if they hear you are not having a resident architect or engineer on site and knowing that you are clueless they could very easily take you for a ride.

Putting right any shortcomings in the work afterwards will cost you a hell of a lot more than 3k then.

Also, unless you have a very, very good reason for discharging your Architect you should keep them to supervise construction rather than bringing in an engineer. Changing consultants like this is not a good idea. To an outsider it prompts questions like "why? was the Architect incompent? Was there a dispute or falling out?"
Also, it might be hard to get an engineer to take on the build for 2 reasons. 1) they are conscious of the above and won't want to be seen to be coming in taking over another professional's work as it looks bad. Hows it going to play out if they have to work together on another project in the future?
2) They won't be familiar with the project history, specifications etc etc and it makes it risky for them. And for that risk they will price accordingly - so you may well end up paying more.

My advice is keep your architect.

TheBoyConor

Also, under H&S legislation a client is obliged to appoint a competent person to the role of PSDP. Since ye are both cluless, ye obviously can't do this yourself. Easiest way to do this is to keep your architect and make sure they are appointed in writing as PSDP (you should have done this already anyway).

All well and good going maverick until someone falls off something.

Richard Roma

Thanks for the replies.

We have the right to terminate the contract after tender. The architect even pointed this out at quotation stage, so there wouldn’t be anything sly about it.

If we decided to replace him with an engineer, then it would purely be for cost reasons (it’s closer to €5k for that stage. I just threw out hypothetical figures in my last post, rather then re-checking the contract. I don’t really think it would put an engineer off. The architect wouldn’t have bad blood towards them as he wouldn’t know who we hired. Also, I don’t think he’d have bad blood towards us given the contract, and our budget.

The re-work/rectification points are very valid. They’re the main things we’re thinking about. It could even come down to forming a view on whether the builder is conscientious and able.

We have written confirmation that our architect is the PDSP. We’ve paid him a portion of that already, and we would pay him the rest.

We’re leaning towards not discharging him, but, we’re st the stage where some very hard choices are required. It may come down to us having to pick between the architect, or a structural feature. That’s why we’re trying to figure out whether it would be a false economy.

Thanks again for your posts, TheBoyConor. They were very useful.

Dudda

Even a poor architect could help you save 3k-5k easily during the build so yours should more than pay for himself. While a decent sum of money it's not massive in an overall build and if you talk to him I'm sure he'll come up with suitable savings. You have to remember its not a 5k saving removing him as you still have to pay an engineer to review the construction and sign off. The point mentioned above with someone to keep an eye on the builder is critical.

TheBoyConor

The answer is yes, it would be a false economy as it is just too risky.

Bear in mind that an engineer could charge you more for taking on the job because they are not familiar with the project, the design or the spec and they will see this unfamiliarity as a risk and will have to consider that in their price.

Even if the engineer is a little cheaper would you not prefer to have the same professional from start to finish so there is no confusion about who did what and head scratching about what is supposed to go where if there is any ambiguity in the drawings and spec. And don't say there isn't any ambiguity - thereis, there always is, nomatter how careful the desigers are.