How is the loss of productivity from the new normal of Working From Home due to Covid-19 to be evaluated, and is there actually any loss at all?

Question

Once the office workforce is all set up to work from home, is there any loss of productivity? What about designers and engineering teams who may need access to specialist software or simulators? Does the general difficulty of not working face to face warrant a claim for loss of productivity?

Steve Hardy · Answer

Interesting question @Paul Checketts . I think when most of us in the industry think about it's productivity problem our minds turn to physical construction activities and then in terms of Covid impact we naturally think about distancing etc. The immediate thought therefore is that working from home isn't really applicable to construction productivity.
If you then think of the chain of activities, working backwards if you like from site operations you then think of management and supervision, some of which needs to be on site but some of which can be carried out home.
The 'dark art' of claims evaluation for extra management costs is probably to lengthy for me to get into here, other than three brief things which come to mind.
1. Understand how the contract differentiates between activity costs, site overhead costs and business overheads/fee mark-ups ( you could do a whole lot of fancy claims preparations only to find out there is no contractual entitlement to claim under whatever provisions you re relying on in terms of loss of productivity)
2. Ensure all management keep detailed and accurate daily time /activity records and be able to compare to a 'real' or suitably benchmarked example of the 'should have' taken time.
3. If you are working under NEC forms write to the PM to apply for a change in the contractually defined 'Working Areas' to account for home working management.
Regarding the specialist software and simulators point you make, well that could be a real minefield where you might get into issues of speed of connectivity, licensing restrictions, data protection and all sorts. Personally i would start with a "KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID" mentality and again apply the principles of the old school 'Measured Mile' approach by:
a) Show with evidence / benchmarking the time or productivity that should reasonably have been achieved
b) Keep detailed daily records of the actual times / productivity achieved.

How is the loss of productivity from the new normal of Working From Home due to Covid-19 to be evaluated, and is there actually any loss at all?

COVID-19

construction

Disputes

productivity

disruption

Paul Checketts

Create your FREE Account