Tarmac foots bill for A421 remedial work

Tarmac has had to foot the bill for repeating highways resurfacing work in Bedfordshire for the Highways Agency (HA) after carrying out a poor standard of works on the contract.

The original resurfacing work of the A421 at Great Barford in Bedfordshire – which was subcontracted by Carillion as part of its £25m-a-year Area 8 agreement for the HA – was carried out by Tarmac in October last year.

However, tests showed that the standard of the finished work did not meet the HA’s expectations and Tarmac was told to re-do the works at its own expense.

An HA spokesman told CJ: “The original surface was too thin, the joints hadn’t been sealed, it was heavily voided and the ride quality was poor.”

Work to rectify the mistake on both dual carriageways of the A421, which included adding an extra 10mm of stone to the surface, was completed over the weekend with further works, not remedial, to be completed by the end of this week.

“The remedial work has been completed on schedule to a very high standard and the contractor has done an excellent job,” the spokesman added.

However, the spokesman declined to state how much the works had cost Tarmac and whether the situation would affect the relationship between the client and its supplier.

A Tarmac spokeswoman said: “Due to some unforeseeable circumstances, the end result did not meet our exacting quality standards. We put the job right when weather conditions allowed and this was completed successfully and to our customer’s satisfaction at the weekend.”