Michelle and Nea - You are correct. Those are harsh words that I shouldn't have quoted from another post. I apologize and ask for the forgiveness of those offended.
In fact, For more than 25 years, my practice produced plans for custom home, single-family and multi-family private owners & developers. I understand the business and economic pressures you cite from first hand experience and realize there are many other firms out there that are struggling to survive. In my practice,
I sometimes felt like a slave to the demands of my few, but consistently producing clients. What I found was that I needed to gently and constantly educate them on the time requirements for what they were asking. I also became a much better administrator of scope where I would even the smallest scope changes with fee and schedule changes. Yes, this was not greeted with celebration, but it only took one or two times before they started to realize that their actions also had consequences. With better understanding of the level of effort required and when given an accurate schedule, over time they became far more understanding and I think they actually respected me more as a professional. Once this type of trust relationship was established, we both were able to plan better and although the time and price pressures still remained, those relationships became very prosperous for both parties.
My hope is that we all are professionals who take their profession seriously enough to move the bar from being treated like commodities up to the place where we return to being viewed as fulfilling a noble and vital role in society. Our actions as professionals can have consequences to our clients, our fellow colleagues, and the AHJ community. I would recommend each of us attempt to better understand the consequences others will face as a result of architects advocating the submission of incomplete plans.
------------------------------
Gordon Rogers AIA
EAS Department Executive
Kitchell CEM, Inc.
Rocklin CA
------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 01-10-2017 20:52
From: Nea Poole
Subject: Permit Sets vs. Issued for Construction
Wow Gordon, that is a remarkably harsh answer to Michelle. "Bottom feeder developers"?!? How nice for you to be dealing with large government or Fortune 500 contracts so that you don't have the embarrassment of dealing with the hoi polloi who build the houses, apartments, and commercial building that house most of us or our businesses and are the shops we use on a daily basis.
Michelle makes a very accurate real world point. Moreover, there are increasingly more jurisdictions that give the architect the date to submit drawings which is ridiculous. It does not matter whether or not you as the design professional think the date is reasonable, miss it and you are pushed back a minimum of of 3 months which may not be a big deal for a bottomless government contract but when an Owner is coming out of pocket for the carry, it can be a huge deal.
There is clearly a divide in this discussion between those who handle large public building contracts pulling in 10 or 15% with generous timelines and those who are working with local or regional developers who pay way less, have much tighter budgets and timelines. Developers who are coming out of their own pocket know time is literally money so they look to have the finishing of drawings, as Michelle indicated adding the non code issue information, added during the time lag of permit review.
To answer the original question we label each sheet "Released for Permit" and once it is ready for construction we release a final set "Released for Construction".
------------------------------
Nea Poole AIA
Principal
Poole & Poole Architecture, LLC
Midlothian VA
Original Message:
Sent: 01-05-2017 21:14
From: Gordon Rogers
Subject: Permit Sets vs. Issued for Construction
Understood Michelle, but the original question was written by an Associate - Architectural Manager at IBI - a global multi-disciplinary A/E firm that is not producing custom home documents for bottom feeding developers. Many of the public facilities they design are regulated by agencies who are significantly impacted with plan review backlog. Some of these agencies are required by statute to address comments on incomplete plans. The practice of submitting incomplete plans is counterproductive to our profession and only exacerbates delays in times of increasing escalation and costs.
Many on the AIA Code committee would advocate putting forward a "one-and-done" plan check initiative on order to reduce plan check times and stop the crazy cycle of having multiple plan reviews on the same project. With our colleagues submitting incomplete plans, this will never become a reality and the backlog problem will only worsen.
------------------------------
Gordon Rogers AIA
EAS Department Executive
Kitchell CEM, Inc.
Rocklin CA
Original Message:
Sent: 01-05-2017 17:52
From: Michelle Plotnik
Subject: Permit Sets vs. Issued for Construction
My take on this was that he was asking about language to place on sets that are 100% complete in terms of information required for permitting but not necessarily 100% complete in terms of information needed for bidding or construction. For instance, all the finishes, light fixtures and cabinet details might not be complete. There might be additional architectural details to be added to clarify design intent. By definition, in my mind, a permit set is one that is complete enough to show compliance with the codes but does not contain all the details, material specifications and selections that will ultimately be added to the set.
In the world of residences and small commercial work some clients only want permit level sets as they want to have flexibility to make their own choices. In my world, it is common to submit permit sets for custom homes to get the process started while all the final details are getting sorted out. I almost never get plan check comments back so my definition of a permit set is clearly one that is complete enough for it's intended purpose. However, bidding or constructing from that set might not be a good idea as there would still be plenty left up to the imagination of the bidder which is never a good idea.
I sign and seal the permit set and place a note across the title block saying that it is For Plancheck Only, is a Permit Set or whatever makes sense for the particular project. In my world the approved permit set get's put away someplace safe and the bidders and builders work from sets that are marked Contract Set and dated. Obviously the Architect has to make sure that we don't make any changes that would create a conflict with the approved work. In my case, even my permit level sets are much more complete than the sets that some designers are submitting and obtaining permits with.
It's amazing that everybody jumped to the conclusion that the original poster was trying to not seal the documents or get away with submitting incomplete work....maybe I'm just naive but I saw it completely differently and assumed he was looking for some clever and very legal sounding language to include on the set that would differentiate the approved set from the set with all the details and specifications that is intended to be out on the jobsite.
------------------------------
Michelle Plotnik AIA
Architect
Michelle Plotnik, AIA, Architect
Murphys CA
Original Message:
Sent: 01-03-2017 10:55
From: Dennis O'Beirne
Subject: Permit Sets vs. Issued for Construction
Does AIA or other design or build agency have wording that reflects that Permit Sets are not intended for Construction?
Our experience is that Permit Sets can range from a 50 to 90 percent level of completion and are not intended to go right into Construction?
Thank You
Dennis O'Beirne AIA, LEED®AP
Associate-Architecture Manager
dd +1 248 936 8062
email dennis.obeirne@ibigroup.com web www.ibigroup.com
IBI Group
25200 Telegraph Road-Suite 300
Southfield MI 48033 United States
tel +1 248 936 8000 ext 51026 fax +1 248 936 8111
NOTE: This email message/attachments may contain privileged and confidential information. If received in error, please notify the sender and delete this e-mail message.