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As someone who has managed a large number of remedial rectifications in residential strata buildings, the one thing that is clear is not all engineers, tradies and remedial rectification contractors are made equal. 

Periods of remedial rectification is usually an unpleasant experience for residents and strata committees. Ongoing variations and delay costs can frustrate a strata committee and exhaust relationships between a remedial contractor and an owners corporation. 

So where does the relationship usually breakdown?

There are many factors that lead to breakdown of trust between contractors and owners corporations, in some cases I have witnessed the building management themselves contribute to this breakdown while acting out of self-importance instead of acting as a conduit for information and reporting. 

In my experience, owners corporations that are under prepared for the real intrusiveness of remedial rectifications is usually where a breakdown begins and is followed up by the “V” word, variations from a remedial contractor. 

Every remedial contractor spends the initial week fielding angry calls from residents about dust which is being transferred by the residents into their living spaces. Unfortunately, remedial works come with dust.

Well-seasoned building management usually prepare with the owners corporation, and extend cleaning services during a remediation period to control and manage as much of the dust as possible as a simple solution. 

Variations- The “V word” is usually where relationships between remedial contractors and an owners corporation really sour.

For GRBM our remedial project management software was born from watching strata managers and owners corporations struggle to keep up with remedial works and variations as they occurred.  

It allows us to manage a project rectification budget, actuals and variance, reporting and rectification time line schedules and reduce the confusion for a more streamlined process.

Apart from all of the above, engineers designing a scope of works (SOW) and their contribution, largely sets a precedence of the remedial flow and is not to be under estimated, however, this early intervention of plugging variation costs is largely overlooked by owners corporation looking for a more cost effective SOW process by engineers. 

From engineer to engineer, a SOW will vary usually based on their contract and their experience, what is not usually considered is a “basic” SOW vs a SOW that plugs holes where variations can be sought, is priceless and worth the additional engineering cost every time. 

Experienced strata managers, legal teams and investigative building management understand that when it comes to engineers, not all engineers are created equally.

Many owners corporations are attracted to “the engineering report with the most images” not the long game of what a SOW that plugs the holes can mean for their residents and their hip pockets.