What is an NEC early warning notice, and when must I give one?
An early warning notice flags anything that could add cost, cause delay or affect how the finished works perform, and you give it straight away.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
For the clause itself, the register and the meetings, see how NEC4 clause 15 works.
The answer
The early warning notice comes from NEC contracts, and in the NEC4 main contract it sits in clause 15. On an NEC subcontract you give early warnings to your main contractor, and it must give them to you. The duty starts as soon as you become aware of the matter, not once you know what it will cost. Give it in writing, through the communication system your subcontract names. Say what the matter is, when you found it, and what it could affect: the price, the dates or the finished works. The matter then goes on the early warning register and to an early warning meeting. There, both sides look for ways to avoid or reduce its effect. An early warning is not a claim and not an admission. Nor is it a compensation event notification, and one never does the job of the other. If the matter turns out to be a compensation event, notify it separately and on time. Missing a warning has a price. If it is decided that an experienced contractor could have warned and you did not, the event is assessed as if you had. The cost a timely warning would have avoided then comes out of your money. On a JCT job there is usually no early warning procedure, so your notices of delay and of loss and expense do that work. Our Compensation Event Loss Prevention service keeps a live early warning register beside your notification routine.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A ductwork subcontractor on an NEC4 subcontract needs the plant room drawings from its main contractor by 16 May, the date on the Accepted Programme. On 2 May it learns they will be 3 weeks late.
What happens
- It gives an early warning that day, through the communication system its subcontract names, saying the late drawings could delay its start and add cost.
- At the early warning meeting, the main contractor agrees to issue the drawings in two parts, so work can start on the first part on time.
- The late second part is still a compensation event, and the subcontractor notifies it separately, inside the period.
- Its quotation shows 1 week of standing time at £3,500, not the 3 weeks that would have followed without the warning.
The outcome
The warning cut the cost of the event to £3,500, and the separate notification kept the subcontractor's claim to it.
To have early warnings given on time and a live register kept beside your notifications, see our Compensation Event Loss Prevention service.