Season 4 of the WeirFoulds Construction Law Practice Group’s popular Tools for Success series of seminars was recently featured in a pair of articles in Daily Commercial News. Now in its fourth season, Tools for Success, hosted by partners Krista Chaytor and Jeff Scorgie, offers a comprehensive look at the latest changes and developments that impact the construction industry, better preparing owners, architects, consultants, contractors, subcontractors and suppliers for the industry’s shifting landscape.
“Setting out clear scope of work key to avoiding design disputes”
In an overview of “Handling Design Issues Without Dispute”, the first installment in Tools for Success – Season 4, which included Natalie Taleb, Managing Partner of Square Vis Architects as a guest, Jeff Scorgie discussed some of the major topics that were covered during the session, including standard form owner-consultant contracts, contract administration, and determining whether a contractor is in default of its obligations under the construction contract.
“This catches a lot of owners off guard,” said Scorgie. “Sometimes they’re partway through, the project has been a disaster, they want to terminate the contractor for cause and they don’t realize they actually can’t do that.
“It is actually something that in my view owners might want to consider removing from their construction contracts.”
“Residential and road sectors seeing most adjudications, ICI may see uptick”
Ted Dreyer, partner at Madorin, Snyder LLP, joined Jeff and Krista for the second episode of Season 4, “What You Really Need to Know About Adjudication.” The session covered topics such as sectors that are seeing the most adjudications, how to start the adjudication process, and general adjudication tips, with Dreyer singling out the importance of ensuring invoices are proper.
“I don’t think everyone appreciated at the outset of this process how important proper invoices would be because there are little nuances where what is required for a proper invoice under the act — we’re only talking about invoices that are delivered by the prime contractor to the owner – they are a little different from what the industry has traditionally gotten,” said Dreyer.
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