Anne Marie Friel
Contractors who can’t show accurate digital records face mounting reputational, contractual and regulatory risks – and could eventually end up being in breach of the law.
That was the warning from Anne-Marie Friel, partner at law firm Pinsent Masons, who highlighted how contractors not in the process of adopting digital information models capable of fulfilling the Hackitt review’s call for a golden thread of information could find themselves on a burning platform.
Speaking to an audience at the Digital Construction Summit last week, organised by Construction Manager and BIM+, she cautioned: “Maintaining the status quo of poor records and poor information on your assets is actually risky and it is only getting riskier. This is regardless of the new regulations that are likely to come post Hackitt report. However, for some buildings affected by potential new legislation, it may even become illegal.”
“Some of you might think [the coming regulations] only apply to high-rise residential buildings. Think again. In all likelihood this is going to apply to all more complex buildings and who knows what else in the future.”
Friel predicted that more stringent requirements from insurers when it came to what information contractors had to disclose about their projects to obtain project indemnity insurance was likely to drive the uptake of BIM further.
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The same onus equally applies to clients/ owners, if not more so. Clients will therefore need to clearly articulate what they are procuring in terms of digital information, as well as the physical asset. This in turn will drive consistent, quality supply chain deliverable’s utilizing BIM processes.
In a modern world, where tasks and many construction operations and decisions are carried out digitally for advancement. I see it as crucial for all professionals in the business of the built environment to go digital, globally.
Thanks Ryan and Folarin.
Ryan, I agree with you, the specific nature of the risks & how they are likely to manifest will depend on your particular business and this will certainly need to be driven by clients/owners. This important group they have their own risks, which I talked about at the DCS – perhaps most significantly of all, they are directly responsible & accountable to the communities who they serve in addition to any legal requirements. As a result I think that clients like Jack at Peabody (who has also been quoted), will be driven to require a change in approach within their procurements (and prepared to agree appropriate terms with their supply chains to incentivise and enable them to deliver this).
Regardless of this however, I also foresee/predict that there will be increasing risks for supply chain as a result of poor information and records on built assets, both from a contractual and insurance perspective, as well as any potential for regulatory non-compliance. If I am right, then this concerns me, as it is not how things have been procured, paid for & approached to date, so it may be difficult for supply chain to manage retrospectively and they therefore need to start thinking about this.
I also mentioned at the DCS that I don’t think we should under-estimate that real change is going to involve challenges and will require some dedicated focus and commitment over the coming years: a change in procurement approach in relation to these issues will be needed, in particular a need to look at whole life cost as opposed to simply cost of construction.