ConsensusDocs301

[steve1]

We are starting a new project (estimated value approx $50 million) that has the requirement that the entire design be delivered via BIM. The general contractor (whom the owner has already hired) wants to be the coordinator of the BIM's from various disciplines and he wants all of us to agree to follow ConsensusDocs301. The owner is in agreement with the contractor so it looks like we will have to sign on.

I did a little research into this and have discovered that ConsensusDocs301 was written for contractors. No major engineering organization has endorsed this document. My question is: have any of you used Consensus301 on a BIM project and if so was your experience with it?

Thank you.

 

[msquared48]

No major engineering organization has endorsed this document.

This raises all sorts of red flags to me. Have you run this past a lawyer?

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering

 

[cvg]

You may want to have a sidebar discussion with the owner...

from what little I have seen and read about these, consensus docs seem to be written to favor the Contractor over the architect or engineer. They are endorsed by essentially every contractor organization out there. See the list:

http://www.consensusdocs.org/about_member-organizations.html

 

[Ussuri]

Have you run this past a lawyer?

Well judging from the list of contributors at the front of the document it looks like it is ONLY lawyers who had anything to do with it.

I have yet to work on a project which uses a BIM system and have never come across this but reading through some of the documents on the web it appears to be a partnering type contract between all the parties involved in developing the BIM model. To what end exactly I am unclear.

...parties agree to mutually shared cost saving bonus arrangments for all participants

My experience of partnering contracts is they start out with the best intentions that inevitably some parties become more 'partners' than others. Then human nature takes over and the nice philosophy behind it breaks down as people retreat to their corner.

 

[rbulsara]

The bottom line is you do not have to sign on something you do not agree to. Have your insurance carrier and attorney (if you can afford them) to review the contract.

If you decide to sing something that may work against you, but you want the job badly, it is your decision but a bad one nonetheless.

I just started on my own, I refuse to sign un-insurable and totally unfair language and it works. I also have told myself not to get into any bad contracts. There are enough fair businesses/client around as long as you have quality expertize to offer.

 

[JAE]

There is mention of the 300 document in the latest issue of Modern Steel Construction Magazine, found here:

Modern Steel Construction, June, 2009
see page 48