Request for Substitute

[ssn61]

I am in MEP field, and although it's not a technical question, I know a lot of you guys know the answer, which is greatly appreciated. When a contractor sends a submittal to an engineer for approval and the item submitted is not in the list of acceptable manufactures then how should the contractor provide the Request for Substitute. Should it go through GC then to PM, or GC to the engineer directly?

 

[walkes]

It should go through the GC and PM, then rejected by the engineer.

The contractor may be providing a submittal on a product that is quite a bit cheaper, he may have included that price in the bid expecting to get it accepted. It may be an unfair advantage to that contractor in the bidding process. If the product is cheaper you may want to issue a proposed change and ask for a credit for the revision. If there is no credit then there is no reason to change products (unless the specified product and approved products are unavailable).


Just my $0.02

 

[MintJulep]

This should be spelled out in the contract.

If it's not, there is probably at least a contract clause to the effect of "unless it's written and signed by the PM it don't mean squat."

So, depending on how paper-centric the project is, and how anal the PM is, either:

Send the request officially through the correct project channel.

or

The GC and the engineer can has things out between themselves, and once they reach an agreement somebody writes a letter to document it.

 

[tys90]

What MintJulep said. The requests don't come from the GC though. They are always from the mfg rep/supplier in my experience. The specifications and substitution form address all the issues that walkes brought up.