Aventures:
@ maverick Tx for understanding lafolabi, life goes on easily when you admit your mistakes rectify and apologies.
Back to our topic abt material procurement. I have had so many clients and we have worked wt different styles. My sincere prayer for all clients is that u will not fall into the hands of a wicked and greedy contractor/Engineers. The reason for my prayers is this: you may procure materials your self and end up buying extra unnecessarily as a matter of fact what you ve bought should be more than enough and yet you will buy extra wout anybody stealing from ur site.How can this happens? A greedy contractor can because of the fact that u are the one buying material and deliberately over use material into your project. Yes you may tell me that is not a problem since everything goes into your project! Alas it is a problem 1. it will end up shooting ur construction cost which u won't discover early until you find out that you have overshot your budget. 2. For instance in a decking where 5 tons is adequate he may end up using say like 7 tons by loading irons more than necessary or cutting the iron in such a way that the wastages will be enormous, and as a matter of fact over reinforcement is even more dangerous than under reinforcement because it cost sudden colapse .
May God help us

mavverick:
I mean in my own experience, here is how i see it.

We all know how unstable the country can be, with dollar rising at any point in time. If a contractor quotes for a carcass at X amount, 5 months down the line they are ready to do roofing, but guess what the roofing sheet from Wichtech which was N3,4,50 in November has then become N3,700 last last.

Who should suffer the shortfall ?

If it were client - Contractor doesnt have a problem. They simply deal with it, either the client compromises or close eye and buy it like that, not contractors problem.

If it were contractor - How many people think contractor will make up shortfall from thier own pocket and how many people think that the contractor will compromise ??


This can apply to any material. I have just used roofing here as per recent experience.

I have always preferred to supply my own material, as long as its not being stolen or spoilt and its being used in my site (big caveat here as i know a particular white Van with Nexthome builders written on it stealing materials up and down the area ), I dont care if i have to buy extra, and I do not feel the contractor should feel sorry about this. I am currently rounding off my plumbing project, I have had to go to my plumbing supplier 3-4 times even after making a very massive purchase, am i happy at spending extra unexpectedly ? NO
Am i happy that the same quality of material is being maintained everywhere ? YES

I have worked with a particular contractor here (BRABUS) who told my security to tell me that he has bought bags of nails where he hasn't, i mean we are talking of 5 bags of nails here @ 25k. If someone can stoop that low, can you trust them with anything else ? Now i am not painting every contractor like BRABUS but i am just giving an insight into what can happen.

My view is that should materials not be enough, and contractor has committed to a specific amount, they will simply compromise or not deliver at all !! Simple as, very few contractors will put thier hands in thier pocket to cover any shortfall. Notice I didn't say ALL contractors as one cannot generalise.


Just my 2 cents.

Aventures:
@ maverick Tx for understanding lafolabi, life goes on easily when you admit your mistakes rectify and apologies.
Back to our topic abt material procurement. I have had so many clients and we have worked wt different styles. My sincere prayer for all clients is that u will not fall into the hands of a wicked and greedy contractor/Engineers. The reason for my prayers is this: you may procure materials your self and end up buying extra unnecessarily as a matter of fact what you ve bought should be more than enough and yet you will buy extra wout anybody stealing from ur site.How can this happens? A greedy contractor can because of the fact that u are the one buying material and deliberately over use material into your project. Yes you may tell me that is not a problem since everything goes into your project! Alas it is a problem 1. it will end up shooting ur construction cost which u won't discover early until you find out that you have overshot your budget. 2. For instance in a decking where 5 tons is adequate he may end up using say like 7 tons by loading irons more than necessary or cutting the iron in such a way that the wastages will be enormous, and as a matter of fact over reinforcement is even more dangerous than under reinforcement because it cost sudden colapse .
May God help us

befto:
Is the so-called White Van still operating in your terrain? You need to put mopo on it

Aventures:
@ maverick Tx for understanding lafolabi, life goes on easily when you admit your mistakes rectify and apologies.
Back to our topic abt material procurement. I have had so many clients and we have worked wt different styles. My sincere prayer for all clients is that u will not fall into the hands of a wicked and greedy contractor/Engineers. The reason for my prayers is this: you may procure materials your self and end up buying extra unnecessarily as a matter of fact what you ve bought should be more than enough and yet you will buy extra wout anybody stealing from ur site.How can this happens? A greedy contractor can because of the fact that u are the one buying material and deliberately over use material into your project. Yes you may tell me that is not a problem since everything goes into your project! Alas it is a problem 1. it will end up shooting ur construction cost which u won't discover early until you find out that you have overshot your budget. 2. For instance in a decking where 5 tons is adequate he may end up using say like 7 tons by loading irons more than necessary or cutting the iron in such a way that the wastages will be enormous, and as a matter of fact over reinforcement is even more dangerous than under reinforcement because it cost sudden colapse .
May God help us

mavverick:


I get your point Oga Adventures, the fact that you didnt answer some of my questions, would it be safe to say that my assumptions/writings are correct ?

In actual fact, one of the points you mentioned about Engineer deliberately sabotaging things is very true, YOU NEED TO SEE THE BLOCKS THAT BRABUS SET ON MY SITE !!!

Its shocking to say the least, or let me say shocking is an understatement.
I just thank God I have a good team of bricklayers who are putting things right, what should be very simple had catastrophic errors, in fact the bricklayers BRABUS brought to my site probably never used a PLUMB or heard of it. The errors are too basic. I am putting together a blog which i will place on one of brabus pages, It would be very unfair to place is on lafolabi page as he has nothing to do with it.

mavverick:


Lafolabi

No hard feelings. Thank you very much.
I enjoy reading your posts and often learn a lot as well.

segcymoor:
How can you give me anyhow materials to use just because u ve liberty of procuring. No way! I used to specify especially type of reinforcement I want for those who wish to 'carry the burden'

lafolabi:
Is the duty of the contractor/engineer to give specifications of the type of material needed.
and the client representative brought the one he or she feels is cheaper. And is a sub-standard or bad material. Sometime the material is being mixed together both good and bad.the dealer usually do this, as he understand that the client doesn't have the experience. or client representative also do it just to make money

it happened in procurement of materials like weak block, rough wood,etc.
A client representative went to Ijebu ode just to bring rough and patched up wood and almost half of it is wasted.and later buy more. In iron, sometimes the dealer mixed local with imported.and sometimes they removed from the boundle of the iron. We alwas ask them to change it. While the work is slow down.
When God gave you honest builder. The best is to allow him to handle it completely.(advice)

Aventures:
@ maverick sir , you are very right that I evaded your question, I was trying to save the house some contractual grammar. You painted a scenario about the change in price of roofing sheet. There's what we call fluctuation in contract. if you have a contract that is rigid that does not alliw for fluctuations then the contractors who takes up a wholesome contract is on his own, but if otherwise the increase would be calculated and the client pays, but even in a rigid contract fluctuation could still be allowed on a passionate ground if the reason is crystal clear like that of economy crunch. I have had such grace before. Never the less if the client is very rigid and not considerate there is always a way out. I ll keep that for now. lol. A yoruba adage says that "what an elder use to eat cold papa is under the leave"

befto:
Thank you. And how can we tell who is an honest builder?
Maybe that will help us choose better in the future.
Thanks

lafolabi:
To be fair, builder should be allowed to do there work and get the right materials and right workers when is needed.so that he will do what to do, when it surpose to be done
Is not every builder that cares about his or her integrity like us.choose your contractor wisely and trust him, is the one deciding on what to do. Your's is to drop the materials on site and go to your office. His decision on site is final and it determine the future of your property. Building is life property it has to be well done.

ADVICE.

Aventures:
Prayer! I believe so much in prayer. A client once tild me that he took his time to pray before choosing his contractors likewise I pray before taking up any job. I always ask God to divert any Job that will give me issues or have problems away from me and He has always answer my prayers.
Also careful study of the contractor in question.