We have just been sent a default notice. Is it too late for Termination Prevention?
No: we raise a notice already running with you the day we find it, and it is answered first, before we build the routine.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
The answer
Send us the notice with the subcontract and the letters so far. On the first call, tell us when and where it arrived. A default notice runs from when it is received, not from when someone reads it. We then read the termination and default clauses on both sides. We map the complaints already made and the directions still open against the records that would answer them. Then we set the routine: who receives a notice, how fast it reaches your commercial team, and the written reply that goes within days. We sign the routine off only after it has run for one live month and every slip found has been put right. Whether the notice is valid in law is a question for your solicitor, and we never assess who caused a delay.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A drylining subcontractor is sent a notice on a Monday saying it is failing to proceed regularly and diligently, with 10 days to end the default. It comes to us the next day.
What happens
- The notice is raised on the first call and answered first. A written reply goes inside the period, with the labour returns and the dates the floors were released.
- The notice and the reply go to the subcontractor's solicitor on whether the notice is valid.
- The termination and default clauses are read, and the open directions are mapped against the records that would answer them.
- A routine is set to get the next notice from the site cabin to the commercial manager the same day. It runs for a month on the live job before it is signed off.
The outcome
The live notice is answered inside its period. The team now knows what a default notice looks like, where it goes and what it gets back.
To have a notice already running answered first and the routine for the next one set up, see our Termination Prevention service.