Client’s warning to ‘reactive’ QSs: Talk to the architects or lose out

A major client has spoken out against the service offered by QSs. The project manager at developer Grosvenor said QSs should take a more active approach once building work has started on site, especially on design.

Ian Morrison said: “QSs are not proactive enough in post-contract cost management. I find it a very reactive process at present. We want them to influence design teams far more from a cost point of view, even if it means that they have to go into the architect’s offices two days a week.”

He added that he wanted QSs to interact more with the design team generally: “Change management processes need to improve. If the QS knows they have made a change, they have to tell the rest of the team. And this applies to the whole team, not just QSs.

We need a system where everybody is accountable.” Morrison is spearheading an overhaul of Grosvenor’s QSing arrangements. He is planning to ask the four regular QS firms that Grosvenor uses to develop standard methods of financial reporting, as recently reported in QS News. He has already asked the four firms – Davis Langdon, Gardiner & Theobald, EC Harris and Cyril Sweett – to come up with a standard approach to cost planning, which they have been developing since December 2005. The approach is to be presented to the Grosvenor board and, subject to approval, it will then be applied to all projects.

We want QSs to influence design teams far more from a cost point of view

Ian Morrison, Grosvenor

Morrison said: “QSs are good at assessing the known factors, but what about the unknowns – how do you put risk elements into a cost plan? We want to integrate all the information into the cost plan.”

He revealed that he is currently considering setting up framework agreements for the four QS firms used regularly by Grosvenor.

“We give them repeat business already, although we do not guarantee it. A framework would be a more formal approach and would plan out work going forward... We would expect performance in return.”

Morrison, himself a former QS, added that he wanted QSs to be “more accurate on costs”. Grosvenor’s planned projects include a 300,000 sq ft residential complex next to the Tate Modern gallery on London’s South Bank. The scheme is a joint venture with Clan Real Estate.