Expand and contract

Down the years, the ECA has produced a range of technical and contractual publications at members’ requests. On the downside, the opportunity for presenting a single branded product has been lost. On the upside, it does mean that when a need has been identified it has been serviced. Members' representatives have overseen the resultant product.

Monthly mailings include at least two A4 price lists, detailing contract pricing and availability. The contracts were all revised in 1999 to comply with the requirements of The Construction Act. The following offers a brief introduction to several of these.

Conditions of Contract for Domestic Work

(Pads of 25)

To ensure compliance with the Part P requirements, all contracts must be in writing. The Commercial, Contracts and Legal committee (CC&L) directed that a new short form of contract be made available; one that was easy to use and was Quality Mark Scheme compliant (QMS). The two-sided, self-carbonated agreement was the result. It envisages that works will not exceed £10 000, nor will they be of high engineering content.

Where the employer is a householder and requires maintenance, or repairs, this is an ideal contract. Obligations are placed on the contractor to work to time. Failure to comply enables the employer to terminate the agreement.

When works commence, the contractor is to give the employer a signed copy of the ECA Warranty, which the customer must countersign – a requirement also fulfilling Trustmark obligations.

Accordingly, the contractor must work to a reasonable standard of skill and care. Where works are undertaken over a longer period or are of a higher value, provision has been made for interim payments.

Conditions of Contract for Domestic Work

The CC&L committee also directed that a shorter form be produced, again self-carbonating, which could be used for small or emergency jobs not exceeding £500 in value. Much simpler in structure and appearance, the form identifies the parties, the nature of the agreement and a price for the work to be provided. The customer has the confidence that he knows what he is buying and the sum he is expected to pay. The agreement provides the contractor with identical safeguards.

Conditions of Tender and Contract

Contracts that can be used where the customer is either a commercial entity or a residential occupier are rare, but this document does just that.

The terms major on payment provisions but also regulate matters such as the Basis of the Tender, Contract Price Adjustments, Insurance Liabilities, Consequential Loss, Guarantee and Completion. The form enables the naming of an adjudicator and facilitates formal contract execution.

The contract strives to provide a fair balance of risk and obligations, but old bugbears are clearly regulated. For instance, earthing is deemed to be adequate at time of tender and, unless specified differently, cable and conduit runs are deemed to have been contracted and costed on being installed in the shortest permissible route.

Inspection and Testing Agreement

This agreement envisages a more discerning employer; one who not only sets out what he wants in the form of a schedule, but who is also responsible for premises (property). The contractor responds with his offer, in the form of a series of proposals, and the resultant contract can then be used for a single property or on a rolling basis covering a number of properties.

However, the actual work in each property is not to exceed a 44-day period. The contractor is permitted to isolate the installation and, although his liability for any act, omission or default excludes consequential or financial loss, it would not actually preclude a claim of loss or damage occasioned following the re-energisation of an existing system that had been inspected, tested and certified as being to an acceptable standard. Contractors should always ensure that their insurance cover is adequate for this purpose.

Other Agreements

The ECA has also developed standard Conditions of Trading that can be used unaltered or as a basis for members’ own terms and Model Conditions of Sub-Subcontract.