Construction Delay Damages Claims: Litigating Design Changes, Differing Site Conditions, and Sources of Delay

Course Details
- smart_display Format
On-Demand
- signal_cellular_alt Difficulty Level
Intermediate
- work Practice Area
Real Property - Transactions
- event Date
Wednesday, January 15, 2025
- schedule Time
1:00 p.m. ET./10:00 a.m. PT
- timer Program Length
90 minutes
-
This 90-minute webinar is eligible in most states for 1.5 CLE credits.
This CLE course will guide construction counsel on effective strategies for proving or defending claims for construction delay damages. The panel will also outline best practices to minimize construction delay litigation.
Faculty

Mr. Pierce’s practice almost exclusively involves legal matters in the construction industry. He works with construction industry clients from the inception of a project and the formation of contracts to the resolution of claims in litigation. He has extensive trial experience in construction matters, and his construction experience includes prosecuting and defending construction contract, construction defect and design defect claims on behalf of owners, contractors and design professionals on both private and public projects. He also assists contractors with bid protests and MBE and DBE matters. In addition to his construction law practice, he also focuses on insurance and risk management issues in the construction industry, with an emphasis on representing insureds to maximize coverage for construction claims.

Mr. Dube is a member of the firm’s Litigation and Construction Law Groups. He advises executives, multinational corporations, and large-scale institutions in the financial services, consumer goods, and pharmaceutical sectors on a wide range of litigation matters. Mr. Dube’s experience includes complex commercial litigation, risk assessment and internal investigations, contracts and securities issues, professional liability defense, antitrust and anti-corruption laws, and constitutional law.

Mr. Haydt has been qualified as an expert witness in construction scheduling, delay analysis, inefficiency and productivity, and impact damages. His expertise lies in the areas of construction claims preparation and evaluation, development and review of critical path method (CPM) schedules, delay analysis, training, and dispute resolution. Mr. Haydt directs and performs all types of analyses from schedule delay analyses to inefficiency analyses and the calculation of damages. His expertise includes drafting expert reports and litigation services such as expert witness testimony, opposing expert cross-examination preparation, and developing demonstrative trial exhibits. Mr. Haydt has provided CPM scheduling services to contractors and owners on a variety of projects, including bridge, highway, educational, and hotel projects. For contractors, he provides schedule development, time extension development, and project schedule advisory services and for owners, such as the New York City School Construction Authority and Pennsylvania DOT, he has reviewed schedules and evaluated time extension requests. Additionally, Mr. Haydt is an award-winning instructor and has presented seminars, webinars, and construction claims-related presentations for private firms and public agencies across the country.
Description
Construction delays are common in the building industry and can result from issues ranging from permit and approval problems to price disputes to differing site conditions. Construction delays are among the most frequently litigated construction disputes, but as a legal argument, this claim is rarely well understood.
Construction delay litigation often centers on proving the duration of a delay, whether a delay was compensable or excusable, its impact on productivity, and appropriate compensation for resulting damages if the delay was non-excusable.
Construction counsel proving or defending damages in delay claims can arm themselves with effective litigation strategies to achieve the best outcome for their client, including leveraging clauses in the construction contract to strengthen their client's position.
Listen as our panel of construction law attorneys discusses best practices for proving and defending damages arising from construction delay claims. The panel will also discuss proactive steps counsel can take to minimize construction delay litigation.
Outline
- Types of construction delays
- Excusable vs. non-excusable
- Compensable vs. non-compensable
- Critical vs. non-critical path delays
- Concurrent delays and non-concurrent delays
- The concept of pacing
- Proving or defending delay claims
- Proving the causes of critical path delays
- Project records relevant to delay claims
- Use of scheduling experts
- Proving or defending delay claims to a jury or arbitrator
- Proving or defending damages
- Contractor's damages for delay
- Extended general conditions
- Extended home office overhead
- Consequential damages
- Owner's damages for delay
- Scope of recoverable damages
- Liquidated vs. actual damages
- Consequential damages
- Contractor's damages for delay
- Best practices to minimize construction delay claim litigation
- Contract provisions
- Mediation of disputes
- During project
- After project completion
Benefits
The panel will review these and other key questions:
- What are the most common types of construction delay claims?
- What factors are taken into account when determining whether a delay is excusable or compensable?
- What are some common methods of calculating damages for delay?
- How can well-crafted construction contracts be used to assert or defend construction delay claims?
- What steps can owners and contractors take to minimize the likelihood of construction delay litigation?
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Unlimited access to premium CLE, CPE, Professional Skills and Practice-Ready courses.:
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