What is a time bar in a subcontract?
A time bar is a clause that says you lose your claim to more time or money unless you give notice within a set period.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
The answer
It often says what form the notice must take, too. Not every notice clause is a time bar. A clause that just says notice shall be given is usually treated differently from one that expressly says no extension or payment will follow without it. Amendments often turn the first kind into the second. Whether a particular clause bars your claim is a question for your solicitor. So are when its period began and whether anything since has changed the position. Ask before you accept a rejection. The practical answer is to find every notice and time bar in your subcontract now. Note each one's trigger, period, form and where it must be sent. Put each in a diary that starts on the day the event happens, and name one person to send each notice.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A glazing subcontractor has signed a subcontract with a schedule of amendments nobody on site has read.
What happens
- The subcontractor reads the subcontract and its amendments for every duty to give notice, and finds 9.
- It marks the 3 that are time bars, the shortest 10 days for a variation.
- It puts each in a diary that starts when an event is recorded, with a reminder at half the period. The site manager is named to send each notice.
The outcome
The next 12 notices all go in on time, so none of the claims they support can be refused for lateness.
To have every notice and time bar in your signed subcontract set out and diarised, see our Post-Signing Contract Review service.