Contractors who can’t show accurate digital records face mounting reputational, contractual and regulatory risks – and could eventually end up being in breach of the law.
That was the warning from Anne-Marie Friel, partner at law firm Pinsent Masons, who highlighted how contractors not in the process of adopting digital information models capable of fulfilling the Hackitt review’s call for a golden thread of information could find themselves on a burning platform.
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Speaking to an audience at the Digital Construction Summit last week, organised by Construction Manager and BIM+, she cautioned: “Maintaining the status quo of poor records and poor information on your assets is actually risky and it is only getting riskier. This is regardless of the new regulations that are likely to come post Hackitt report. However, for some buildings affected by potential new legislation, it may even become illegal.”
“Some of you might think [the coming regulations] only apply to high-rise residential buildings. Think again. In all likelihood this is going to apply to all more complex buildings and who knows what else in the future.”
Friel predicted that more stringent requirements from insurers when it came to what information contractors had to disclose about their projects to obtain project indemnity insurance was likely to drive the uptake of BIM further.