Contract Communicator Systems Blog

Local representatives in Asia-Pacific region

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 23:21:00 GMT

We're very happy to announce our local representatives for the Asia-Pacific region - Plus 3 Consultants.

Plus 3 has offices in Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur and will be implementing and providing support for C-COM in the Asia-Pacific region.

Plus Three Consultants (HK) Ltd
Skyline Tower
18 Tong Mei Road
Mongkok, Kowloon
Hong Kong

Tel: +852 2851 2528
Web: http://www.plus3.com.my

Update

Fri, 26 Aug 2011 08:54:00 GMT

Time flies when you're having fun! We've been inundated with demand for C-COM and been really busy starting relationships with new clients and enhancing C-COM, unforuntately our blog has taken a bit of a backseat! Well, sit tight, here comes the first update in a while as to what we've been up to...

Requirements Schedule & Site Diary

The Requirements Schedule now interfaces beautifully with the Site Diary in addition to the Claims Administrator. Requirements like: access; drawings; materials; etc. are imported from your programme into C-COM's Requirements Schedule, once imported you can choose to track any items' fulfilment via a specific Site Diary. So the people on site are prompted when a particular requirement is about to become due and indicate when the requirement is either partially or fully fulfilled.

You can perform a variety of on-demand searches on the Requirements Schedule and export these on your letterhead or in MS Excel format.

Response to this feature has been great and we'd like to thank Carl Phenix and Francois Vivier from Group Five for all their input on this.

FIDIC support

Our FIDIC support has been greatly enhanced. We now offer greater flexibility to support your own way of working and easier to use claim composition and review facilities.

Another key enhancement has been the exposing of claim related data alongside the initiating event in the Event Manager. The effect is a clear link between the factual cause of a claim and its commercial impact. This facility is also available in our NEC system.

C-COM version 4.0

Development of our next generation system is well under way. C-COM vesion 4.0 is being built from the ground up on a brand new architecture which offers tremendous scalability and control to our clients. For now, that's all the info we can release, but watch this space.

New projects

We've been working on some high profile projects in the following new industries: roads; fossil fuels and rail with the likes of Basil Read and Bombela CJV. We're very excited about what's on the cards for the rest of the year too as we look set to enter other new sectors too.

NEC Compensation Events....simple idea, complex delivery

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 13:58:00 GMT

An obvious potential minefield for both parties under the NEC form of contract is the Compensation Event (“CE”) processes. Make no mistake, no matter what you call them, we’re talking here about “claims”. The entire nature of the NEC ECC is to avoid unnecessary CE’s through early identification and collaborative solution-finding but once a CE arises, it involves a far more rigorous and complicated procedure to resolve than any other standard form of contract. In fact, its an interpretation minefield that requires meticulous management and a finger on the pulse of every CE due to the many turns it can take in its life.

Herein lies a conundrum with the NEC ECC: In the first instance, the nature of the agreement is that CE’s must not remain hidden. They must be brought to the fore and dealt with. This is an admirable intention. However, the fact of the matter is that this encouraging attitude towards CE’s means that any sizeable NEC contract will have many, many CE’s to deal with (hundreds if not thousands). Secondly, the collaborative nature of the NEC has meant that the provisions of clause 60 which deals with CE’s is in fact a tortuous and potentially confusing process. The net result is that the parties are likely to have many CE’s to deal with via a relatively complex resolution process.

The NEC has kept its text as simple as possible but it relies on flow charts and guidance notes to explain its processes. The NEC ECC option A contract runs to a mere 30 pages (without secondary options). However, the guidance notes covering the same subject matter run to 100 pages and the flow charts run to another 100 or so pages. 200 pages to explain the operation of 30 contract pages? If one ever doubted the potential complexity of the NEC ECC, ask why so much explanation is needed? There are over 50 individual flow charts covering the 30 pages of contract. The flow charts dealing with the CE clause 60 alone run to some 18 pages and the Guidance notes run to some 11 pages. This means that the explanatory notes for the CE clause are collectively 1 page less than the entire NEC ECC contract text itself! Don’t misunderstand what we are saying here, we admire the intent of the NEC ECC but its very nature can work against itself and give rise to unforeseen disagreements over issues such as interpretation and implementation of its processes.

If you sit down and map out the NEC clauses for dealing with CE’s in a single mind-map, you'll see that it looks like a plate of spaghetti! Bear in mind that, for any project of any reasonable size, to obtain the benefit that the NEC no doubt has the potential for, this process will have to be followed for hundreds, if not thousands of CE’s. It should also be borne in mind that non-adherence to certain of the processes may well cause the contractor or the employer to forfeit rights. Once again, the seemingly hidden complexity of the agreement can pose substantial risk as rigorous adherence to potentially complex processes is needed to protect oneself and to obtain the benefit that the contract has to offer.

It's difficult to conceive how parties involved in contracts let under the NEC ECC can hope to manage the CE processes without a proper management system such as C-COM. The risks just seem so great. Parties to these types of contracts would be well advised to invest in proper training and systems like C-COM before embarking on their projects.

New early warning and risk features

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 11:47:00 GMT

Our early warning generation facilities are now more powerful than ever, we've added more fields to allow C-COM to reproduce your existing early warning templates and a new "request meeting" facility is now tightly integrated.

The risk register (which is generated on-demand from loaded risk and early warning data) is now customizable, allowing you a greater level of control over its contents and also features a printer-friendly view which displays your company logo in the header, export to Excel option is also available.

Watch out for some exciting updates to the claims side of C-COM coming soon!

All clients upgraded to .Net Framework 4.0

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 22:20:00 GMT

We've just finished upgrading everyone to the new Microsoft .Net Framework version 4.0. We've been really busy testing CCOM on the latest version of the framework and once we were confident to roll it out we proceeded.

We'll be releasing some exciting features and enhancements soon made possible by the adoption of the new framework. We're dedicated to the Microsoft platform and are proud to be operating the latest technology on our servers to ensure our clients are always at the cutting edge of IT.

Watch this space for news!

CCOM implemented on R11.2 billion NMPP project

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 12:30:00 GMT

We are proud to announce that CCOM-N Solo and CCOM-N Multi (our NEC specific products) have been implemented on the R11.2 billion (US$1.44 billion) NMPP project.

The New Multi-Product Pipeline project involves the construction of a pipeline for the transportation of petrol, diesel and jet fuel from Durban to several locations in Gauteng and surrounding areas. The extent of the pipeline is in excess of 700km. The project is the largest in Transnet's portfolio and addresses the security of supply for South Africa.

CCOM-N is being used for management of site data, risks and compensation events on several of the contracts the project consists of.

To date approximately 2700 site diaries have been submitted from various NMPP site locations and processed on CCOM.

New groundbreaking site diary system

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:38:00 GMT

Contract Communicator now features a completely overhauled site diaries facility. The new facility allows for direct submission of site diaries from site by subcontractors, main contractors and/or employer's representatives.

A robust, built-in approval system with custmizable workflow management notifies users when their sign-off on a diary is required and similarly updates submitters of diaries during the approval process. Diaries are digitally signed online.

Should a site diary be rejected, the submitter may submit a new diary for the same date, the original version is always retained.

Powerful reporting facilities allow immediate access to resource usage reports and other site related subjects.

The site diary also detects risks from the data entered and notifies the relevant people.

The CCOM site diary is included in all our CCOM-F and CCOM-N products and is available as a standalone product too.

For more information, contact us.

Exciting new features

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 22:08:00 GMT

We've been hard at work at adding some great new features to our CCOM products. The following facilities are currently in beta testing and will be available shortly:

Requirements schedule calendar view
Now you can view all actions that need to be performed or have been performed by your team on an interactive customizable calendar. The calendar colour codes items according to whether they are overdue, urgent, fulfilled, fulfilled late or upcoming. We've also introduced easy reading to-do lists to make planning your work easier than ever before
Interactive timelines
Explore how events have unfolded on an interactive timeline, view all claim- or compensation event-related actions and click any action to view the full details. Forensic analysis is about to become a whole lot easier and possibly... fun!

We'll let you know as soon as the features are released. Screenshots available shortly.

16 November 2009 UPDATE: The new features are now available. See screenshots below...

Requirements schedule calendar view

Risk timeline

NEC compensation event administration

Fri, 24 Jul 2009 13:57:00 GMT

We've recently deployed our latest batch of updates for contract-integrated NEC Contract Communicator installations. We've spent a lot of time on the compensation event manager and the control panel. Enhancements are as follows:

Updated reminders relating to compensation events for both parties - administrators can now fine tune both the content of the reminder messages as well as how far in advance reminders are sent
Improved facilities for quotations and assessments - new controls make adding assessments easier and project manager decisions can be implemented directly from the compensation event action screen without having to browse to the quotations manager
Early warning / compensation event report - a new on-demand printable report showing all pertinent information relating to early warnings and compensation events

Blog live

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 15:08:00 GMT

Our blog is officially online! Check back regularly for updates. We'll be keeping everyone posted on any new features, issues or news related to Contract Communicator.

If you have a related blog, get in touch with us so we can link up.

New site launched

Thu, 28 May 2009 14:37:00 GMT

If you're reading this then you're on the all new Contract Communicator website. We've put a lot more product information into the new site as well as some more information about the people behind Contract Communicator.

Highlights include:

an extended product tour
a blog (which we'll be using to post all sorts of Contract Communicator related news and updates)
information on our new affiliate programme
customized solutions - details on our bespoke solutions for enterprise

Check back regularly since we're still adding more functionality and refinements.