Trouble with rubble

Steve Dempsey was cock-a-hoop when his fledgling company, Advanced Demolition and Dismantling, won a £29,250 contract from Amey Building to undertake a soft strip-out of an office building in Stratford, east London.

That was last April. Dempsey recalls thinking that "working for a blue-chip company like Amey" would put his one-year-old Greenwich-based company "on the map".

Dempsey thought that if Advanced did the business on the Boardman House project, not only would it look good to list Amey as a client when tendering for other clients but it could also lead to getting more work from £389 million turnover Amey.

Now, nothing could be further from Dempsey's mind and he is locked in an acrimonious battle with Amey over payment. He vows that he will never work for the firm again.

Dempsey claims that the scope of the work changed dramatically once Advanced started on site and that this, together with other issues outside of his firm's control, meant that what was intended to be a two week contract ended-up taking seven weeks.

The first thing to change on the contract was the downsizing of the originally intended 1.5 tonne capacity hoist to one with a payload of 500 kg.

This smaller hoist was not made available until Advanced was into the ninth day of its original 16 day subcontract. Even after the hoist was commissioned, Dempsey reports that it was out-of-action, via breakdowns or electrical supply problems, on 10 further days, either for part or all of the working day, during the time that Advanced was on site.

Advanced's managing director claims that downsizing the hoist meant that it was taking "three times as long" to get rid of the stripped materials from the building.

Dempsey says that power supply problems also caused hiccups elsewhere on site. He claims that his workers weren't able to work in the basement because the lighting wasn't working for the first two-and-a-half weeks of the subcontract and likewise a goods lift serving the basement was out of action until the end of the fourth week.

After Advanced had entered its second week on site, the scope of the refurbishment of Broadman House was altered to include stripping out the old mechanical installations to make way for a new air-conditioning system.

Previously the intention was to adapt the existing system. Another firm was brought in to do the mechanical strip-out and tension flared between the two demolition crews. Dempsey remarks: "We didn't know there was going to be another demolition contractor on site."

Hindered

He further claims that the new firm hindered Advanced's work, that bottlenecks occurred, and that Advanced had to clear up some of the other firm's mess.

The delays, alterations and additional work extended Advanced's time of site from the original date of 8 May until 9 June. The extra time on site caused Advanced cash-flow problems, as the demolition contractor's surveyor Larry Sheen admits candidly: "The level of funding was causing us distress." At a site meeting on 19 June, Dempsey says he told Amey: "Look we are being cash starved."

Advanced has submitted a draft final account of £46,658 together a draft loss and expense claim of £36,693. In return, Advanced has been paid £32,195 so far and Amey is offering £42,000 for full and final settlement.

Dempsey has turned down this offer and is seeking arbitration. He reasons that the roughly the same resources were employed over the seven weeks and therefore the sum payable to Advanced should be roughly three times the value of £29,250 for the original two week contract.

Dempsey says that he was reluctant to submit the loss and expense claim or revert to arbitration as he had hoped to reach an amicable agreement. He says that his firm acted in good faith on numerous issues such as undertaking the work without any drawings. "We didn't get the drawings until the third week of the job - when we should have been finished anyway."

Likewise, Advanced did not receive the amended DOM/2 subcontract terms and conditions from Amey until after the original finishing date - the firm has so far refused to sign the subcontract as it does not like some of the contract conditions.

"I think we have been shafted. We had every right to walk off site, but we stayed on. Now this." says Dempsey.

Requests

Despite several requests, CJ could not get a response from Amey. However, CJ managed to track down Mike Turner a former site manager on the Broadman House project.

Turner was an agency worker employed by Amey but he left before the project was finished after a disagreement with Amey. Turner says he holds no grudge against Amey. Turner argues that Advanced was "not given a proper briefing and nobody knew the mechanical work was going to be stripped out by another contractor."

Turner says the biggest problems were encountered on the third floor where both demolition contractors were working alongside one-another at the same time.

He explains: "Basically Advanced had no chance (to do the work effectively)." He confirms: "No drawings were supplied to Advanced until weeks into the contract."

Turner opines: "I don't think they (Advanced) were given a fair crack of the whip."

He says Advanced "did try to get things done" and did not adopt a confrontational approach. He thinks that the fast-track nature of the project meant that Amey had little time "to put the project together properly".