The final account is due and I need my position checked
The job is finishing, the final account has to go in, and it needs checking before the other side sees it.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
If nothing is on paper yet, see how to structure the account by heads, not by grievance.
What's happening?
A final account pulls everything together: variations not yet agreed, delay costs, retention, deductions, and every certificate and payment so far. It is usually put together at the end by the site team, from whatever is in the file. So proven items end up sitting next to estimates, and next to delay heads nobody has actually costed.
Your main contractor's surveyor will find those weak lines first. One estimate dressed up as a measured figure makes every other line look doubtful. Mix up the gross value with payments and retention, and nobody can see what is actually owed. That is how a sound account gets discounted as a whole.
The solution
Build the schedule first. Give every item its subcontract reference, its calculation, its evidence and the decision you want from your main contractor. Keep the gross value, payments, retention and disputed deductions on separate lines. Mark estimates as estimates rather than burying them in the total.
Final Account Dispute Prevention reviews the account before you submit it, the way the other side's surveyor will. Every item gets a verdict, we set out the repairs still possible, and you get a realistic range on your own figures. Heads nobody has costed yet are flagged, not built. You decide what goes in, what is repaired first and what stays out.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A subcontractor's final account stands at £4,300,000 against a subcontract sum of £3,900,000. The site team put it together from the applications, and it goes in at the end of the month. It is reviewed as it stands, not rebuilt.
What happens
- Each item is given its subcontract reference, its calculation, its evidence and the decision it asks the main contractor to make.
- Sixty-two variations are listed. Eleven of them, worth £140,000, carry no instruction reference. All eleven are found in the main contractor's site instruction register and repaired.
- Three items worth £38,000 turn out to be estimates, not measures. They are moved below the line rather than left in the total.
- Previous certificates of £3,850,000, the payments and £95,000 of retention are reconciled on their own lines. That way the gross value is never confused with the balance.
- Two delay heads, valued at £120,000 by multiplying up weeks, have not been built from cost records at all.
- They are flagged as needing separate costing work, with the delay period from a programming expert. They stay in the total, marked as not yet built.
- The account is submitted at £4,262,000, with the estimates and the unbuilt heads shown for what they are.
The account in figures
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Subcontract sum | £3,900,000 |
| Final account before review | £4,300,000 |
| Variations without an instruction reference, repaired | £140,000 |
| Estimates moved below the line | £38,000 |
| Delay heads marked as not yet built | £120,000 |
| Account as submitted | £4,262,000 |
The outcome
The main contractor's surveyor values it at £4,180,000 in the first assessment. Every difference is one the submitted account already names.