CONSTRUCTION CONTRACTS
BUILDING A BETTER CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT By ANDREW WIEDERHOLT One Sunday evening at supper with my wife’s family, someone asked our nephew if he had any good jokes. Without missing a beat, he sighed, shook his head and said, “I was hoping to have a construction joke ready…but it’s behind schedule.” Construction projects are complicated undertakings that depend on uncontrollable factors and involve significant expense and effort. Add that to most issues not arising until work is underway or fully complete, and it’s easy to see why problems occur. The best way to prevent a project’s complete derailment is to have a plan in place accounting for as many outcomes as possible, while leaving enough flexibility to manage unforeseen circumstances. At a minimum, a construction contract must contain five essential elements.
52 MAY/JUNE 2024
TK Business Magazine
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ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF A CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT
SCOPE A contract’s scope defines the parties’ rights and obligations, and the project’s schedule and objectives. The scope should contain the parties’ full names, addresses and signatures, the included and excluded work, mandatory milestones, delay consequences and quality standards. Important scope provisions include: • That the completed work will comply with all plans, specifications and applicable laws. • That the contractor will submit and regularly update a detailed construction schedule. • A “time is of the essence” clause. • Defined construction start and completion dates. • The necessary requirements for the project to be considered complete. Although not fatal to enforceability, construction contracts should be in writing to provide concrete evidence of the agreed-to terms and, in Kansas, extend the time to assert a breach of contract claim to five years.
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