Found out today that my "friend" who had mysteriously stopped asking us to design his houses for a 2 year period had been deleting the title block, adding the home address, and developing without us. What things can we do to prevent this from happening in the future? Some note on the plans requiring engineer confirmation? A special title block? We used a particular font, which he wasn't smart enough to find. A surveyor contacted us asking for our cad work to stake foundations. He sent us "our" plan set, and we didn't recognize the owner or address.
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Contractor Stealing My Plans 5
- Thread starter bigmig
- Start date
Lomarandil
Structural
If he's falsely representing that you've performed engineering as part of his plans, you take that to the board.
If he's stealing your plan content (details, etc) and applying them to other projects, but isn't required to or representing that you've engineered this new project... that sounds more like a contractual and intellectual property legal case to me.
If he's stealing your plan content (details, etc) and applying them to other projects, but isn't required to or representing that you've engineered this new project... that sounds more like a contractual and intellectual property legal case to me.
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he was built a home I engineered, then turned and built several more without telling me, using the same plan, but modifying the title block so the building dept wouldn't know.
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Then you need to contact your lawyer now. I hope you had a good contract.
I'd guess people get away with this most of the time because most likely nobody notices. With that said, I have a clause in my Engineering Agreement which would hopefully protect me if I ended up in this situation:
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So they presented your stamped drawings for numerous projects. First you should contact the building department to notify them of the fraud so they can issue a stop work order. Get your lawyer involved and insurance involved. The homeowners will likely want to take action against them also. Towns should verify plans prior to issuing permits, I had a project where they issued a permit without plans and didn’t know until I called to see how a permit was pulled.
In some cases plans/designs for residential aren't required to be sealed/stamped by a licensed engineer to secure a building permit.
If so - the applicable engineering board wouldn't have a dog in the hunt.
But depending on your agreement/contract with the client you may have a case to pursue as others have stated.
If so - the applicable engineering board wouldn't have a dog in the hunt.
But depending on your agreement/contract with the client you may have a case to pursue as others have stated.
The engineering board probably won't have much to say about this. In my state, they weasel out of this sort of thing by claiming they only have authority to regulate licensed engineers, and no one else. In other words, they can fine engineers and suspend or revoke engineers' licenses, but they can't fine non-engineers or do anything else to them. All the board will do to non-engineers is issue a cease and desist letter. I think it would be up to the district attorney's office to decide whether or not to pursue anything further than that against a non-engineer because it is against the law to practice engineering without a license, and good luck with that unless it is something very high profile.
I imagine you could report it to the general contractors' licensing board if there is one in your state, and they should be able to discipline the GC, hopefully by revoking the license, not that that would actually stop him from building more houses. I'm sure this is a violation of their rules of conduct, or at least I hope it is.
I would certainly contact a lawyer about this. I imagine you would have a civil contract case against the offender.
I imagine you could report it to the general contractors' licensing board if there is one in your state, and they should be able to discipline the GC, hopefully by revoking the license, not that that would actually stop him from building more houses. I'm sure this is a violation of their rules of conduct, or at least I hope it is.
I would certainly contact a lawyer about this. I imagine you would have a civil contract case against the offender.
Because whether it's designed by a registered design professional or just some residential code jockey, the building official will still want to ensure it's being built to code. Anything bigger than a very small backyard shed is required to submit in the jurisdictions where I work most frequently, and even those need a site plan showing they're complying with zoning setbacks.
Very few houses built need any sort of engineering, but they all get plans submitted so they can make sure they're buying the right sized joists, digging the right footings, etc. And then the inspectors know what to inspect for (in a perfect world).
This applies to the US
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- #16
I think in retrospect the reason this happened was because the architect (drafter in this case) builder , developer and real estate agent are one person.....him.
There were no checks and balances, no team. If there was, it would have been harder for him to do this. I still can't identify why; it wasn't money. It wasn't because we did a bad job. He just did it, sort of out of spite. The building dept. in this particular town may as well not exist. Sometimes I think they don't even get of their car during inspections. So they weren't checking him.
Maybe we just made it to easy for him and presented the opportunity on a silver platter, at which point spite and opportunity crossed paths and bad choices were the result.
There were no checks and balances, no team. If there was, it would have been harder for him to do this. I still can't identify why; it wasn't money. It wasn't because we did a bad job. He just did it, sort of out of spite. The building dept. in this particular town may as well not exist. Sometimes I think they don't even get of their car during inspections. So they weren't checking him.
Maybe we just made it to easy for him and presented the opportunity on a silver platter, at which point spite and opportunity crossed paths and bad choices were the result.
@bigmig, why do you say his motivation wasn't money? In situations like this, where someone steals something or fraudulently obtains something that they would have had to pay for otherwise, money or greed always seems to me to be the most likely and obvious motivation, even if you think the person involved has plenty of money to have obtained the "thing" by just paying for it.
Its entirely possible that your "friend" believes they own the IP and thus are free to do whatever they wish with it. I'd recommend making the phone call to ask, and seeing if there's an amicable solution that doesnt involve expensive attorneys. IME its usually best to give folks benefit of the doubt and not assume either a mistake or malfeasance.
I've been on both sides as contract-engineer and as customer doing everything from writing the SOW to approving the final product. Many of the stateside contracts I've seen didnt even mention IP ownership bc unless the contract details specific IP to be retained, the customer owns everything including the liability.
I've been on both sides as contract-engineer and as customer doing everything from writing the SOW to approving the final product. Many of the stateside contracts I've seen didnt even mention IP ownership bc unless the contract details specific IP to be retained, the customer owns everything including the liability.
In the US the engineer retains ownership unless otherwise noted. Customer could not own the liability since they are not licensed, if officials accept plans with a stamp they are liable but unlikely to see repercussions since government officials are mostly protected. Now if the building department is an independent contractor hired then they face greater liability.
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