Engineers Responsibilty

[KeySol]

So I work as an engineer for a truss company and have been getting more and more requests from other structural engineers about truss designs we performed 10+ years ago. They want this information because they will be installing solar panels on the roof and want info to help them figure out if the roof is suffiecient for the new loads. I have only been here 5 years so all of these requests are for jobs I had no part in designing. Plus, are they also asking the Engineer of record for the structural and foundation designs?

My question is what responsibilty do I have to provide this information? We only have hard copies of some of these jobs and they are in storage and we could spend at least a few hours to find the requested info. Can I or should I charge them for this time (not at my full rate of course)? Do we actually have to provide this info or is it just a courtesy to the other engineer? What would they do if they couldn't get this info.

I am sure were not the only ones getting these requests so how are other companies handeling this?

Thanks for the help in advance...

 

[mijowe]

Sounds like a marketable service.

 

[Ron]

You have no obligation to provide this information. If it is burdensome, then charge for it. Establish a standard rate for providing such and be ready to charge it when they call. You might even establish a request form that you could fax or email to them that provides some protective language for the re-use of your designs (in particular, an indemnification of the engineers involved and the company for providing the information).

They should be willing to pay for the information, since it will save them the trouble of analyzing the entire roof framing.

 

[towerengr]

If you put yourself in their shoes, you will realize that your company has a moral obligation to provide the design data. Of course, your company should charge for their time and expense (yes, you could even include some markup as this data is valuable to some end user) and the requestor should pay for it.

The only thing I would like to add is, your company must add disclaimers in their covering letter stating that they have no knowledge of any revisions due to construction changes or modifications. In addition, they cannot be held liable for any consequences due to the requestor's interpretation and use of this data.

 

[cvg]

unless you have a binding contract or you designed the building, I don't believe there is an ethical obligation to anybody besides perhaps the engineer of record, the owner of the building or the agency that granted the original building permit. Certainly not to some contractor who wants to slap a solar panel up on the roof. However, I would encourage you to do it if you can and charge full price.

 

[msquared48]

I would also think that any change in the original loading conditions would warrant a recision of any product warranties. That should also be stated so it is clear that the new EOR for the revision is picking up the new liability.

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
Motto: KISS
Motivation: Don't ask

 

[Andrewstructure]

Vulcraft and most joist manufacturers will supply this information if you can give them the joist tag info.

It would increase your companies status among other design professionals if you could manage to keep track of your projects and have them available for future work.

 

[torreyrroberts]

I used to work for a truss company and we did provide this information with disclaimer when requested free of charge. For the most part it brought in more work because other designers and engineers would recommend us because they knew we were easy to deal with and had the information. However if it takes significant time to find the information, charge them for it.

 

[csd72]

Agree with most of the comments above.

It is a professional courtesy to provide it but it is reasonable to charge an 'archive fee' to cover reasonable costs to retrieve it.

 

[woodman88]

One of the engineering companies I work for (20+ years ago) had a policy of giving out such design information on old jobs to the homeowners who were remodeling. This lasted until one of the homeowners sued our client (the truss manufacturer) over the designs. Not sure how the case worked out, but the office changed their policy to giving information out only to the clients not the current owners. So a good look at your contracts over who owns or have the right to handout the designs may be warranted.

Garth Dreger PE
AZ Phoenix area