Their assessment is well below my account and they say it's final
The number they've put on our account is a long way below ours, and it's presented as final.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
What's happening?
An assessment usually arrives as one number, and calling it final is meant to close the discussion. Behind that number, whole heads may be missing. Items may be valued lower with no reasons given. A finality clause in the subcontract may be relied on.
When cash is tight, it is tempting to treat the number as binding, or to shrug it off as an opening offer. Either can cost you. Under some subcontracts, an assessment or certificate becomes binding unless you challenge it within a short period. Miss that window and the missing items may be gone for good.
The solution
Record the date the assessment arrived and keep it exactly as received. Ask your solicitor the same day what it does under your subcontract and whether a challenge period is running. Then compare it head by head with your account. Ask for the balance they accept to be paid now, separately from the items in dispute.
Final Account Claim rebuilds the figures, answers each objection the documents support, and marks each difference as supported, overstated or unknown. The response goes out in your name within any period your solicitor confirms. Where a head will not move and the sums justify it, we build the money side of an adjudication on it. To stop the next account landing short, Final Account Dispute Prevention builds it as the job runs.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A subcontractor's account of £1,460,000 comes back from the main contractor's surveyor assessed at £1,215,000. The covering letter calls it final. The statement's own wording refers to a period within which it can be challenged.
What happens
- The assessment is saved exactly as received, with its date and version, before anything else.
- The solicitor is asked that day what the wording and the dates mean. That is a legal question the figures cannot answer.
- The assessment is compared head by head with the supported account: six variations worth £62,000 are not mentioned at all.
- Fourteen variations are valued £118,000 lower, with no reasons given. A £65,000 loss and expense head is rejected because, they say, it was never notified.
- The accepted balance of £1,215,000 is recorded separately and its payment requested.
- The response goes out within the period the solicitor confirms. It asks for reasons on the fourteen and rebuilds the six missing items with their instructions attached. It answers the notice point with the correspondence record.
- The surveyor revises to £1,301,000, adding the missing variations and £24,000 of the measured differences.
The account in figures
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Supported account | £1,460,000 |
| Assessment | £1,215,000 |
| Variations left out | £62,000 |
| Variations valued lower | £118,000 |
| Loss and expense rejected | £65,000 |
| Revised assessment | £1,301,000 |
The outcome
Variations worth £94,000 and the £65,000 head remain in dispute, each with its reasons now on paper.