Geotechnical Dispute 4

[genomty]

Good Afetrnoon:

The firm for I work has been requested as third party in a dispute between two other firms. As far as i know, the project involved considers a 15 story building with two basement levels. Apparently dispute started due to a complain of someone with building contractor that was not agree with the firm 1 geotechnical report, apparently (according to his or her judgment)soils described in report are different to the encountered, contractor hiere another geotechinal firm, which alleged after review the firm 1 report that report was wrong, they performed some additional borings and gave new recommendations, as result bearing capacity has been reduced and foundation cost has raised, so, they have been discussing about this issue one or two weeks. Now we are involved as referee in this dispute. We have received only the firm 1 report,based in the information we have within two block perimeter, this report does not look to be right. We are going to review report two and issue a meeting to interview both consulting firms, based in our previews expirience with firm two, it is possible that they report will be quite conservative, so, we are anticipating that we are going to drill at least a boring for verification. After all the process we are going to present our conclusions. Question here is, Is there any standard procedure or guideline to follow in order to perform this task? This is the first time that I am involved in a dispute like this,I mean, I've participated in forensic and CMT disputes, but never in a case like this, as third party. It seems to be quite interesting but one of the firms will result damaged and they would not be happy, I'll be glad to receive some advices

Thnaks in advance

 

[apsix]

Thanks for the update.

You certainly made the right decision by walking away.

 

[darthsoilsguy2]

What a waste of time... throwing around conditions like that at the end... sounds like their house is a mess inside.

they would probably put you guys on a shelf until they can sue for the money to pay you...

they must have forgotten that this whole thing is "their problem" not "your problem".

 

[dik]

I'm glad he walked, the project appears to be a real snake pit... a couple of other issues:

Costs for delays in construction,

No initial scope for the outcome. Would there be a resolution based on the third report? or, could they just have three independent reports?

It might have been interesting to have an idea of the penetrometer values for the various strata just to get an idea of the material and an idea of the results for both testing agencies.

Dik

 

[Ron]

genomty...my congratulations on remaining professional and refusing to sign a poor contract. Too many engineering firms do not critically read contracts until it's too late. Others assume contracts are just risk management and will sign anything, knowing that statistics are with them.

Sounds like a good project to be away from anyway.

Good luck and thanks for the update.


Ron

 

[racookpe1978]

It's a tough loss "giving up" the hours you've spent corporately analyzing, writing up, studying, researching, and (internally) "wasting time" on this contract.

All, of course, without the dollars/rubles/yen/dinero/pounds/marks/Euro's or francs to actually pay for the invested time just to get you to a point where you could write the contract in the first place.

But it sounds like the right decision.