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Where the rules come from

The authorities that follow the work everywhere

Some authorities do not belong to a jurisdiction. Federal safety regulation, the ISO standards the industry organises information around, and the international contract forms all travel with the work. These apply on top of whatever the local register says.

37 authorities, 4 of them statutory, across 11 areas of practice. Every entry links to the publisher.

Contract administration

The contract forms, payment statutes and notice regimes that decide when you get paid and what you have to serve to keep the right.

StatutoryFree to readcurrent

Miller Act, 40 U.S.C. ss.3131–3134

United States Congress

payment bonds on federal constructionnotice and suit deadlines for federal subcontractor claims

Included because federal construction in California carries NO mechanics lien and no state stop payment notice, the payment bond is the entire remedy, on a different clock. A California contractor applying the Civil Code deadlines to a federal job on Californian soil will miss the claim. This is a real and live gap, not a completeness note.

De facto standardPaywalled

AIA Document A201, General Conditions of the Contract for Construction

The American Institute of Architects

progress payment mechanicsgrounds for withholding certificationstored materials conditionsretainage reduction at substantial completionconditions precedent to final payment

Needed because several payment application conventions only make sense against the withholding and substantial completion machinery in the general conditions. A contractor who does not know the certifier's stated grounds for withholding cannot tell a legitimate deduction from a negotiating position.

De facto standardFree to read2nd edition (2017)

Delay and Disruption Protocol

Society of Construction Law

delay analysisextension of timedisruptionrecords
Contract administration in every market, in detail

Health and safety

The statutory safety duties on site and the bodies that enforce them.

Cost control

What governs valuation, variation, retention and the reporting of cost against value.

StatutoryFree to readcurrent

Davis-Bacon and Related Acts, 40 U.S.C. s.3141 et seq.; 29 CFR Parts 1, 3 and 5

United States Department of Labor

prevailing wages on federally funded constructionweekly certified payroll on federal work

Federally funded work in California runs both regimes at once: a weekly WH-347 alongside the state certified payroll, with the higher applicable rate governing. The certified payroll template in this lane covers the state record only, so this gap must be closed before that template is used on a federally funded job.

Quantity surveying

The methods of measurement and the conventions that decide what a quantity means.

De facto standardPaywalled

Common core of the principal methods of measurement

No single publisher: the shared core of RICS NRM2, CIQS MM-CW, the Australian and New Zealand standard method of measurement, and RICS POMI

net measurement basislaps, joints and waste priced in the rate rather than added to the quantityunit stated against every billed itemcomposite work resolved into separately measured components
De facto standardPaywalled

Elemental cost analysis convention

No single publisher: the convention is restated in RICS/BCIS NRM1, the CIQS elemental format, ASTM E1557 UNIFORMAT II and CEEC guidance

elemental cost plan and cost analysis presentationcost per unit of floor area reportingelement expressed as a share of total cost
De facto standardPaywalled

MasterFormat

CSI / CSC

work results classificationtrade breakdownbill section orderspec section numbering
Quantity surveying in every market, in detail

Estimating

The data sources and bid rules an estimate is built against.

De facto standardPaywalled

MasterFormat and UniFormat

Construction Specifications Institute and Construction Specifications Canada

work results classification for cost codingelemental classification for early estimatesschedule of values structure on building work

Included because schedule of values and cost code structure on Californian building work follows CSI conventions while civil work follows the agency bid item list. Systems that assume one coding spine will mis-handle half the state's work, which is the practical reason this is recorded as an authority rather than assumed.

Common practicePaywalled

ENR Construction Cost Index and Building Cost Index

Engineering News-Record (BNP Media)

building cost and construction cost index seriescity-level cost indices including San Francisco and Los Angelesmaterial and labour cost trend reporting

Sits behind the Californian escalation index rather than being used directly. Recorded so the derivation chain is visible: an estimator quoting CCCI is ultimately quoting a two-city ENR building cost average, which is a real limitation when the project is neither in the Bay Area nor in Southern California.

Common practicePaywalled

Recommended Practice on Cost Estimate Classification (including the construction-specific practice)

AACE International

estimate classification by design maturityexpected accuracy rangesestimating methodology by classcontingency expectation by class
Estimating in every market, in detail

Planning and programme

Programme, delay analysis and the consent regimes that gate a start on site.

De facto standardFree to readGAO-16-89G

GAO Schedule Assessment Guide: Best Practices for Project Schedules (GAO-16-89G)

US Government Accountability Office

schedule best practiceschedule credibilityrisk-adjusted schedule

Broader and more narrative than DCMA: it covers whether the schedule is complete, sequenced, resourced and risk-adjusted. Where DCMA gives a pass/fail number, GAO gives the reasoning a planner would write underneath it.

Planning and programme in every market, in detail

Document control

How information is named, issued, and proved to have been issued.

De facto standardPaywalled

United States National CAD Standard (NCS)

National Institute of Building Sciences

sheet identificationdrawing set organisationlayer naminggraphic standards

Directly relevant to build-set-graph and classify-pages: a set whose sheet numbers follow NCS can be ordered and related automatically, and a deviation from it is itself worth flagging to the user.

Site engineering

Setting out, survey control, temporary works and the standards behind them.

Specification

The specification systems and master texts a scope is written against.

De facto standardPaywalled

MasterFormat

Construction Specifications Institute (CSI) and Construction Specifications Canada (CSC)

division and section numbering of bills of quantities and schedules of valuesproject manual filingthe section number that links a priced line to its specification
De facto standardPaywalled

SectionFormat / PageFormat

CSI / CSC

specification section structurethree-part formatpage format

A specification section that is not in three-part format reads as written by someone outside the industry, no matter how good the content. This is the single highest-leverage convention in the whole spec discipline.

Sustainability

Energy, carbon and environmental performance requirements and the schemes that certify them.

BIM and information management

The information-management standards a project's models and data are delivered under.

Common practicePaywalled

ISO 7817-1: Level of information need

ISO

level of information need

The UK/ISO framing. Where BIMForum LOD says how developed an element is, LOIN says how developed it needs to be for the purpose at hand.

Statutory, de facto, or habit

Statutory means the law says so and a regulator can stop your job. A de facto standard binds you because the contract adopts it, which in practice is just as binding and is easier to argue about. Common practice is what the market does with nothing published behind it, and the honest thing to do with those is record them as convention rather than cite a standard that does not exist.

Knowing the rule is not the same as meeting it on a Tuesday

AEC Stack keeps the paperwork side of the register handled: registrations, insurance certificates, payment notices with their deadlines, and the documents a buyer asks for before they will let you start. Across Canada, built deepest for Ontario.

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