Conflict? 3

[XR250]

I finished our basement off 5 years ago without a permit. I did the plumbing and electrical work (this is allowed). No other mechanical or structural work was performed. We are trying to get a permit after-the-fact. The inspections department needs a letter from a PE or a plumber and electrician stating that the work meets current code. Is it a conflict of interest for me to write the letter stating that? I have a PE in mechanical and structural.
I had a plumber and electrician come out to verify that it does meet today's code.

 

[phamENG]

If it's really to code, then I'd say no conflict. There is, however, an appearance of a conflict. Call the AHJ and lay it out to them. If they say no, we want a third party then so be it.

I'm starting to explore the possibility of adding an out building or two on my property, and I plan to design them myself and submit everything to plan review with my seal on them.

 

[Bill West]

phamENG's future home plans remind me that as the professional employees of a factory owner are certainly qualified to vouch for work in the factory it shouldn't be a conflict for the professional owner of a premises to do the same. The independent review is the AHJ.

The counterpoint is your own comment that you used a plumber & electrician to check the work, it suggests that you may not currently know enough about the nut and bolt details of the code, that you are outside of your professional knowledge. Maybe you should seek a letter from the licensed tradesmen after all. I've known how to do wiring since I was 10 but I wouldn't install an outlet nowadays if I knew it had to pass a modern inspector's opinion, too many local interpretation details to get right.

Bill

 

[XR250]

Thanks for all the responses.

 

[BrianPetersen]

"needs a letter from a PE or a plumber and electrician stating that the work meets current code"

If that's the case, just get the plumber and electrician to write something up (nothing wrong with helping them do so) and be done with it.

 

[XR250]

If that's the case, just get the plumber and electrician to write something up (nothing wrong with helping them do so) and be done with it

Yup, just wrote up letters for each of them to sign

Thanks

 

[CWB1]

Yes, it is a direct conflict of interest. Everything we do as engineers must be peer reviewed to be ethical, why would this be any different? If the AHJ says only trade reviews are necessary then I'd limit it to that, but if they want a PE review then it must be an independent audit.

 

[phamENG]

Everything we do as engineers must be peer reviewed to be ethical

I'm not quite sure I follow. If you stand by this statement as written, you're condemning much of the professional engineering community as unethical. Certainly 100% of the sole practitioners out there. It's unethical if you take on work for which you are not qualified or about which you are not knowledgeable - and fail to disclose it and then seek out the necessary support from somebody who is (subcontracting, etc.). But for me to go look at a sagging floor in a house and determine that the joists are undersized or have water damage and not have another engineer look over my work, or design a simple convenience store without having a peer review doesn't set off any ethics alarm bells. It's always beneficial to have another set of eyes on it to catch errors, but I've never heard it put forward as an ethical requirement.

That's why I said there is an appearance of a conflict of interest. If XR250 is licensed as a PE in the mechanical discipline and current on his CE, registrations, etc., is knowledgeable about the requirements, and knows that the work was done to code and is adequate, then he can ethically say it was done to code and is adequate. Somebody else may raise the suspicion that he wouldn't say it wasn't anyway, and this is the appearance of a conflict of interest - usually just as bad in a practical sense, but doesn't mean that he did anything that was actually unethical. There's just no way to prove it either way.

 

[stevenal]

A third party PE hired by XR would not be independent, but acting (ethically one hopes) in his client's interest. I see no reason why one can't be their own client, just disclose all.

 

[phamENG]

Well I'm just destined be a contrarian here, I guess.

I can't agree with you stevenal. Acting in the interest of the client is secondary. Acting in the interest of the safety of the public (in this case anyone who may own, occupy, visit, or otherwise use this building in the future) is the primary ethical responsibility. The ethical duty to the client is finding the most economical way to satisfy the primary duty.

 

[stevenal]

Of course public safety is primary, I didn't mean to imply otherwise. A PE working for a separate client or himself has the same obligation to safety and all the other ethical obligations.

 

[Ron]

@stevenal....we are required by ethics to not be an advocate for our client if it compromises health, safety or welfare. We can only be an advocate for our client if it does not compromise our ethical considerations and if our client is right in our justifiable opinion.

 

[stevenal]

Ron,
I agree with your stated hierarchy of engineering ethical considerations, and find it puzzling why you think I don't. My only point here that the same hierarchy exists when the client happens to be one's own self. Public health and safety remain paramount either way and always.

 

[CWB1]

If you stand by this statement as written, you're condemning much of the professional engineering community as unethical. Certainly 100% of the sole practitioners out there.

I stand by it as written as does most of the engineering profession, engineering ethics courses, and even NSPE who has sought to limit liability for firms participating in inter-company design reviews. Pretty much every profession has this in their ethical codes and implements it in their standard processes btw, my wife doublechecks doctors and others' work daily in the medical field where even minor oopsies hurt and win million-dollar lawsuits.

The first tenet of ethics is nonmalfeasance; admitting the fallibility of man and seeking to minimize mistakes by all reasonable means necessary. The first obligation of the engineer is to ensure public safety which as ethics courses teach, means following proven standard work processes to ensure nonmalfeasance, completing design reviews, etc and working within both our education and experience. Like most consulting engineers, I complete a myriad of small projects every year and regardless of scope, I always complete a peer review whether it be five mins or five days and document the peer and concerns accordingly. Recently that included a "why did this shaft break," and "please route these 15 lines" - quick, easy projects. Sole practitioners are a fairly small percentage of the engineering profession and even among them, I have known few that didnt practice peer review. As a corporate attorney reminded years ago during annual training, "A well-tested, well-reviewed mistake that kills someone is a company lawsuit. An untested or unreviewed mistake that kills is manslaughter."

 

[phamENG]

Thank you for that, CWB1. You certainly present a compelling argument. I'm not 100% on your side, but I do agree that you make some good points.

I welcome peer reviews and would like to see them done more. The issue is this - if I have a fee for an inspection that is only a few hundred dollars, and a peer reviewer (because we don't have anything like the legal protection called for by NSPE's model legislation) wants a couple hundred for his time and potential liability exposure...I'll lose a big chunk of my work to the next guy who doesn't particularly care. Not trying to justify unethical behavior - just trying to point out the economic barrier to fully embracing the ideal.

Since you feel you're in the majority on this one, I'm curious to see what others have to say about the idea of a non-peer reviewed project being inherently unethical regardless of size, scope, and risk. I'm afraid I can't speak to the engineering ethics courses - I took a more general ethics course through the philosophy department when I was in school, so we didn't cover industry specific topics like this. Perhaps that could make a good critique of the program I went through. I'm also not sure I see how your reference to NSPE ties in. I reviewed the Code of Ethics, and the only reference to reviews is that you aren't allowed to do them without the other engineer's knowledge. I think you're referring to the model legislation limiting liability for third party peer reviewers and making in house reviews privileged and immune to discovery in litigation. While this is certainly aimed at promoting peer review and thorough in house QC, I don't see how it takes the extra step to say that not doing it is unethical.

If you have any references or citations to share, please do. I take ethics very seriously and I'm happy to read more and expand/change my views if the arguments are there to prove me wrong.

 

[Rabbit12]

Expecting everything an engineer does to be peer reviewed is crazy. It doesn't happen and it's never going to happen.

I work for a company that does peer reviews before we issue IFC drawings. Even then I still do things daily that aren't peer reviewed. If I make a change during construction that doesn't go through our peer review process, but that is hardly unethical.

 

[XR250]

I honestly, have never had anything peer reviewed. So, here is the outcome of the situation. It turns out you are only allowed to do your own plumbing and electrical work if you live in the house for at least 2 years after the permit. Since this is a retroactive permit and we are selling the house, they turned me down even thought the project was 7 years old. I got an electrician and plumber to sign off on the work. The inspector came out and all he did was test to see if the arc fault interrupters were working – that’s It! He did not even wear a mask (said he did not need one LOL)

Thanks for everyone's comments.

 

[EZBuilding]

I would love it if all of my work was peer reviewed. Only way that becomes a reality in the sector and market that I practice in is if it becomes a Code requirement. Developers and Contractors have a much larger influence than designers do - I doubt we would see that happen.

 

[CWB1]

The issue is this - if I have a fee for an inspection that is only a few hundred dollars, and a peer reviewer (because we don't have anything like the legal protection called for by NSPE's model legislation) wants a couple hundred for his time and potential liability exposure...I'll lose a big chunk of my work to the next guy who doesn't particularly care.

The reality is that there is always going to be that proverbial "next guy" compromising their ethics or risking a lawsuit or prison for a buck. That doesnt mean the rest of us should stoop to that level, we should instead do the right thing proudly so that courts understand this is not commonly accepted practice and can impose sentence on the criminally unethical accordingly. The other reality is that many consultants already conduct peer reviews either with a regulator or simply by agreeing to swap services with a liability agreement when others need it with no money involved, even with larger firms.

As to NSPE, I dont particularly care for much of their legislative or other efforts nor are they a regulating agency so I dont waste much time on them. I'm an active member of ASME, SAE, and several others purely for the continuing education and standards governance, otherwise I wouldnt waste much on them either. A quickie search did find the quote below in the proposed legislation however, and I have seen quite a few other references to their believing that peer review is an ethical requirement and should be a legal one as well.

NSPE believes the Peer Review Legislation should......State clearly that peer review must be done before substantial completion of the project

[link ]

https://www.nspe.org/resources/issu...d-position-statements/peer-review-legislation

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I honestly, have never had anything peer reviewed.

So the engineers who made sworn statements as to your competency prior to licensure committed fraud?

 

[phamENG]

I agree with you that, when faced with the choice of behaving ethically and losing work, we should always behave ethically - but I'm still not convinced this qualifies as unethical behavior.

That is an interesting arrangement. I wonder if it's a regional thing? I see you're in Michigan - anyone in other parts of the country familiar with limitation of liability agreements and free swapping of peer review time? It really does sound great - I may poke around and see if I can find a way to set up a similar exchange where I am. If anyone else has on a small scale, I'd be interested to see how it went and how you accomplished it.

For NSPE - to me that reads more like a clarification of the definition of peer review. In point 1, they make a parenthetical note that it doesn't apply to "value engineering and other such tools." All the projects I've seen have received their "value engineering" after the design is completed and the owner gets sticker shock over the price. It's not a peer review - it's a review to find ways to change the design. That's the kicker. If it happens after substantial completion, any change is a design change - not a design correction. There's probably a better way of putting that, but I can come up with one tonight. So...for a "peer review" to fall under the protection of that recommended legislation, it has to happen before substantial completion. Not necessarily that it has to happen always and on every project.

So the engineers who made sworn statements as to your competency prior to licensure committed fraud?

That seems needlessly provocative. Question wasn't aimed at me, but I'll take it anyway. No. They didn't. They were not my peers. They were my professional superiors attesting to the fact that I'd earned the right to have the title Professional Engineer through my display of knowledge in engineering. They reviewed my work, yes, but those weren't peer reviews. They were EOR to project engineer reviews so they could maintain responsible charge of their projects.

Perhaps we should take this to a new thread if it is going to continue.