I need some advice on making a claim against an architect for professional negligence.
The architect designed our loft conversion and also prepared building reg drawings. He also engaged with his SE to produce calculations. We never met the SE and paid the architect for all the work just mentioned. On BC's inspection, BCO noted that his plan incorrectly shows one of the walls to be a single brick when in fact it is half brick wall. The BCO noted the half brick wall even before he entered the house. The bricks are exposed so it's pretty obvious. I spoke with the architect, he said he never came across something like that, but he consulted his SE and they resubmitted their drawings and calculations. I do not understand the calculations, but they seemed the same to me. So I compare the previous calc with the amended ones, I went line by line and the only thing that changed was the length of the pad stone under the steel beams. I contacted the architect to ask if he is confident this will satisfy the BC as the calculations are the same except for the pad stone. He did not respond. After 3 weeks BC responded that this did not offer justification and asked to revise the plans again. To cut story short, the architect did not produce workable plan, he just left us with this mess. I found another SE who managed to convince the BC that this structure can work, however we needed to do some additional work which costed us extra £7,200 to make the loft compliant with the building regs.
Once the loft was signed off by the BC, I approached the architect asking him for a refund of his fees and to pay for a the extra work needed to fix this mess. He responded by saying he was happy to refund the fees but "I think it is unfair for you to expect me to pay for the additional costs. 7.2 of our terms makes very clear that the plans and calculations must be approved by building control before works commence."
He also said that he was happy we found someone who was able to come up with a design and he "accept this is something we would not have been able to do". He also said he approached several other engineering firms who said it was not possible either.
I'm planning to take him to a small claims court. There is no point of me taking a lawyer as whatever (and if) I will recover will go towards legal fees. So I need to build a strong case against him that is not too technical and gives us best chance to get the money back.
I need to make few points here that might or might not be significant:
1. we removed the roof before I realised we need to engage with BC (with my inexperience I thought you contact them when you need them....
) We didn't do any work in terms of inserting steel beams. But the roof was off. So it can be claimed we commenced work before plans were approved by BC.
2. We then waited for BC to validat the plans. Does this count as plans being approved, as architect points out in his response to me? I am afraid this clause by 7.2 is open to interpretation and by approve me might mean the "final" approval once BC had a chance to scrutinise his plans and ask questions. He might say the plans were not approved because the BC was not happy with his justification in which case we shouldn't have commenced work...my argument to him is that we had to commence work in order for BCO to come and inspect site at which point BC noted his plan incorrectly indicated we have a single brick wall.
3. I asked three SEs for help, the first two concluded this design could not be theoretically justified. The third SE was the only one who actually thought of asking the BC what was their exact concern with the wall. He got some more info and this way he managed to find a solution. Still, two out of three SEs I contacted didn't know how to solve this ( it wasn't their design so maybe they didn't try too hard...). Could our architect claim that he consulted a number of SEs who said his design was not possible to justify and therefore he is off the hook? What I'm thinking is that maybe our case shows that a SE with reasonable skills was unable to justify the design and therefore we cannot expect our architect to produce a solution.
4. While we were waiting for a response from BC when our architect submitted his first revised plans and calculations we commenced work by putting steel beams. It was winter, roof was off and we concluded that if it's only justification they need surely the architect and SE can produce it. We thought that if the structure was unsafe the BC would ask us not to go ahead. I don't know if that was right move, but that's what we did.
What are the most compelling points we should highlight when making the case? Or maybe you think we stand no chance. Will be interesting to hear from you.
The architect designed our loft conversion and also prepared building reg drawings. He also engaged with his SE to produce calculations. We never met the SE and paid the architect for all the work just mentioned. On BC's inspection, BCO noted that his plan incorrectly shows one of the walls to be a single brick when in fact it is half brick wall. The BCO noted the half brick wall even before he entered the house. The bricks are exposed so it's pretty obvious. I spoke with the architect, he said he never came across something like that, but he consulted his SE and they resubmitted their drawings and calculations. I do not understand the calculations, but they seemed the same to me. So I compare the previous calc with the amended ones, I went line by line and the only thing that changed was the length of the pad stone under the steel beams. I contacted the architect to ask if he is confident this will satisfy the BC as the calculations are the same except for the pad stone. He did not respond. After 3 weeks BC responded that this did not offer justification and asked to revise the plans again. To cut story short, the architect did not produce workable plan, he just left us with this mess. I found another SE who managed to convince the BC that this structure can work, however we needed to do some additional work which costed us extra £7,200 to make the loft compliant with the building regs.
Once the loft was signed off by the BC, I approached the architect asking him for a refund of his fees and to pay for a the extra work needed to fix this mess. He responded by saying he was happy to refund the fees but "I think it is unfair for you to expect me to pay for the additional costs. 7.2 of our terms makes very clear that the plans and calculations must be approved by building control before works commence."
He also said that he was happy we found someone who was able to come up with a design and he "accept this is something we would not have been able to do". He also said he approached several other engineering firms who said it was not possible either.
I'm planning to take him to a small claims court. There is no point of me taking a lawyer as whatever (and if) I will recover will go towards legal fees. So I need to build a strong case against him that is not too technical and gives us best chance to get the money back.
I need to make few points here that might or might not be significant:
1. we removed the roof before I realised we need to engage with BC (with my inexperience I thought you contact them when you need them....
) We didn't do any work in terms of inserting steel beams. But the roof was off. So it can be claimed we commenced work before plans were approved by BC.2. We then waited for BC to validat the plans. Does this count as plans being approved, as architect points out in his response to me? I am afraid this clause by 7.2 is open to interpretation and by approve me might mean the "final" approval once BC had a chance to scrutinise his plans and ask questions. He might say the plans were not approved because the BC was not happy with his justification in which case we shouldn't have commenced work...my argument to him is that we had to commence work in order for BCO to come and inspect site at which point BC noted his plan incorrectly indicated we have a single brick wall.
3. I asked three SEs for help, the first two concluded this design could not be theoretically justified. The third SE was the only one who actually thought of asking the BC what was their exact concern with the wall. He got some more info and this way he managed to find a solution. Still, two out of three SEs I contacted didn't know how to solve this ( it wasn't their design so maybe they didn't try too hard...). Could our architect claim that he consulted a number of SEs who said his design was not possible to justify and therefore he is off the hook? What I'm thinking is that maybe our case shows that a SE with reasonable skills was unable to justify the design and therefore we cannot expect our architect to produce a solution.
4. While we were waiting for a response from BC when our architect submitted his first revised plans and calculations we commenced work by putting steel beams. It was winter, roof was off and we concluded that if it's only justification they need surely the architect and SE can produce it. We thought that if the structure was unsafe the BC would ask us not to go ahead. I don't know if that was right move, but that's what we did.
What are the most compelling points we should highlight when making the case? Or maybe you think we stand no chance. Will be interesting to hear from you.
