Contractors doing things not according to plan them NEEDING me to drop everything and tell them how to make it right so they can pass an inspection.
This has become my life this year.
I have 4 projects currently. One is 15/16ths of the way done and I worry about them very little. My main thing with them is coordination with us and the other shops in the facility.
One was recently turned over and is in the closeout portion of the project. We dragged the contractor kicking and screaming across the finish line. On site, work was completed in a manner I am accustomed to and looking for, but administratively??? Holy shit. They didn't mobilize for 9 months after NTP. When they did, the plan was to jam this thing in as fast as possible and move on. Their guys showed up lacking even the most basic, required licenses to be performing work on the items they were installing. They had not attended any of the required training we have them go through. Their submittals are garbage. They were unable to read the contract or specifications to the point they were making arguments to us that an "independent" inspection required by the specs should be provided by us instead of it meaning the inspector just couldn't work for them. The on site guys were what enabled this contract to actually progress.
The next is a project where a specific component failed during application. We brought it up and took lots of pictures, made our reports, etc. The contractor installed it (lots of it....) thinking it wouldn't be too bad to fix the problems in place. We determined the system is worthless as applied. We need a complete redo, but the subs and 2nd tier subs are fighting us all the way. We pull the string, so to speak, and find out the entire system is compromised. It just gets worse and worse. After 2 months of fighting subs, firing one 2nd tier entirely, we moving back towards a good repair.
My 4th is a utility project where the contractor did not mobilize for 2 months after NTP, only showing up in Oct. to begin excavation work in Eastern Wa. Read that last one again. Because of "We gotta get this thing done" my dirt sub decided it would be fine to install nearly a mile of Schedule 80 pipe, backfill it, and compact as they were going. Pipe this size takes 24 hours for the cement to create a proper weld. The entire way I'm telling the prime that I've never seen anyone backfill, compact, THEN test. It's insane. If, during testing, the line can't hold the required amount of pressure they were digging every stick of it up. Guess what happened??? We've got nearly 10 days so far of the excavator doing nothing other than digging up connections to find the leak. They've got 500' so far that I've passed. The math doesn't look good. On top of it, I guarantee these guys are going to ask for weather days.
The FAR Section 52.236-5: Material and Workmanship is fast becoming my friend.
(c) All work under this contract shall be performed in a skillful and workmanlike manner. The Contracting Officer may require, in writing, that the Contractor remove from the work any employee the Contracting Officer deems incompetent, careless, or otherwise objectionable.
This is an extremely powerful clause we've begun using. Note that the 3 part test is an "or" and not an "and" situation. I particularly like the over-generalization of "otherwise objectionable." That's a pretty damned big stick.
