In the construction industry, Bill of Quantities (“BQ”) is a part and common feature in many tender and/or contract documents for construction projects. Traditionally, BQ is prepared by the consulting quantity surveyors (“QS”), particularly under traditional or conventional building procurement system, usually following the Standard Method of Measurement published by the Institution of Surveyors, Malaysia (ISM) for building projects. A BQ typically comprises of preliminaries, preambles and measured works.
When there is a disruption or delay in the project, which often leads to prolongation period of the construction contract, it is usual for additional preliminaries to be claimed over the prolongation period by the Contractor under prolongation costs, which essentially is a loss and expense claim, as provided under the relevant contract clause/s of the standard forms of construction contract in Malaysia.
In this article, Entrusty aims to provide readers with a better understanding of Preliminaries, by answering the
following:-
• What are preliminaries? ;
• The relevant provisions under the common standard forms of building/construction contract in Malaysia;
• Case studies/scenarios;
• Methods in assessing additional costs of Preliminaries.
