Get the paperwork looked at early
Whether a missing or late notice has fixed the sum in your favour is a question of documents and dates. The answer is often better than you expect, and the earlier the documents are checked, the more options are still open.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
Why it matters
A missed or late notice may have fixed the sum in your favour under section 110B of the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996. Whether it has turns on a few documents and dates: what was applied for, when it was served, what notice came back and when. Those facts are easiest to gather in the weeks after the cycle. The options that follow from them are all still open: a demand, a referral to adjudication or a negotiation from strength. Leave it 6 months and the receipts are lost and the people have moved. By then your main contractor has issued three more notices that muddy the position. An early check takes an hour and tells you what you are holding.
How to do it
- Gather the application as sent, the receipts, any notice received and the dates of each, the day a cycle looks wrong.
- Mark the dates and get the documents in front of someone who can check them that week.
- Write down what the check says about the position and what options remain open.
- Act on the option you choose while the dates are still fresh, rather than carrying the cycle into the final account.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A subcontractor applies for £72,000 on cycle four. The Payment Notice arrives 2 days after its deadline and certifies £48,000. The QS thinks the late notice may matter, but assumes the difference will sort itself out at the final account, 8 months away.
What happens
- The commercial lead gathers the application, the read receipt, the Payment Notice and its email, and notes the dates.
- The documents are checked the same week. The notice appears late, and the sum applied for may be the sum due.
- The subcontractor writes to the main contractor within the week, setting out the dates and demanding £72,000 by the final date for payment.
- The main contractor pays £72,000 rather than face adjudication on a cycle where its own notice was late.
The outcome
The £24,000 difference is recovered inside the cycle. Left to the final account, the late notice would have been one point among fifty. The sum would have been traded away in the settlement.
To have this done for you, see our Underpayment Claim service.