Photograph the condition before you change it
A dated photograph is the cheapest evidence on any job, and arguments about what was there are won by whoever has the pictures. Before you open up, strip out or build over, photograph what is there.
Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.
Why it matters
Once the wall is opened, the ground dug or the old service stripped out, the original condition exists only in memory. Every argument about a change starts with what was there. Were the existing ducts where the drawings showed them? Was the ground as described? Was the finish already damaged?
Whoever has the photograph answers that question, and whoever does not is left arguing. A dated photograph taken before the work costs a minute and needs no skill. Once the work is done, it cannot be taken at all, and the change is valued on your main contractor's account of what you found.
How to do it
- Photograph what is there before any opening up, demolition, digging or building over: a wide shot first, then detail.
- Include something in the frame that fixes the location, such as a grid line, a door number or a drawing pinned to the wall.
- Leave the date and location settings on in the phone, and file the originals in the variation folder the same day.
- Write a short note wherever the condition differs from the drawings or the survey, and send it with the photographs.
Example
Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.
The facts
A subcontractor is instructed to replace a run of existing pipework in a ceiling void. The drawings show the void clear. On opening up, the foreman finds it full of old, disused cabling that has to come out first. That adds about £3,200 of work.
What happens
- The foreman photographs the void from the access hatch before touching anything. Then he takes close-ups of the cabling with the room number in shot.
- The commercial manager sends the photographs to the main contractor's quantity surveyor the same morning, with a note that the clearance will be priced.
- The cabling is removed and the pipework replaced over the next 4 days.
The outcome
The £3,200 clearance is agreed on the photographs alone. Without them, the reply would have been that the void was clear as drawn, and the subcontractor should have allowed for whatever it found.
To have this set up for you, see our Unpaid Variation Prevention service.