Building Procurement by Design and Build Approach

Abstract

As a method of procuring buildings, the design and build approach accounts for an increasing proportion of building construction output in the United Kingdom. This paper reports a survey of contractors, designers, and building clients regarding design and build issues. These issues include the circumstances in which the approach would be suitable, the project organizations commonly employed on design and build projects, the difficulties commonly encountered by practitioners, and the attitudes of the construction professionals to the procurement route. The main findings of the research are as follows: (1) The use of design and build is on the increase with many clients perceiving it as providing better value for money and giving rise to less disputes than other procurement methods; (2) the approach can be used satisfactorily with most sizes of projects provided the client is experienced; (3) although more and more of the construction professionals accept the approach, there is still considerable resistance to its use; (4) the few disputes encountered have concerned abortive work, inaccuracies in the client's brief, conflict between the brief and the contractor's proposal, and valuation of variations; and (5) a clear brief is the most important prerequisite for success.