The Subcontractors Blueprint

Episode 167 of The Subcontractors Blueprint opens a ten-part series on the mistakes that cost subcontractors money, starting with the most expensive one of all: working without a signed subcontract. Jacob Austin sets out what a letter of intent actually is, the four jobs a usable one has to do, and the ten ways that starting early turns from a calculated risk into work nobody pays for. He covers t...

Episode 166 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin explain why subcontractors lose the argument about what a variation is worth, even when the instruction is in writing and nobody disputes the work happened. The contractor's quantity surveyor arrives with quantities, rates derived from your own tender and a method. You arrive with a number. Jacob walks through the four-step valuation hi...

Episode 165 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin take on cross contract set-off, where a main contractor deducts money from a live job because of something that went wrong on a different one. Two jobs are two contracts, and the phrase "it's all one account" is not a legal position. Jacob sets out the only three routes that make the deduction lawful, why the unamended standard subcontr...

Episode 164 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin explain the obligation to proceed regularly and diligently, and what it does not require of you. Running late because the trade in front of you ran late is not a failure to proceed diligently, and a main contractor cannot shorten your period by reissuing his programme. Jacob covers where the obligation genuinely bites, why constructive...

Episode 163 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin take apart the daywork sheet, starting with the six words printed beside the site manager's signature. For record purposes only is not the insult subcontractors take it for. It is an accurate description of the only thing he can verify, which is who was there and for how long. Jacob works through where daywork sits in the valuation hier...

Episode 162 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin deal with verbal instructions, and what to do when you are told to move something on site and nothing ever arrives in writing. Standard form subcontracts require instructions in writing, but they also provide a route when one is given face to face. You confirm it yourself, and if the contractor does not dissent within the stated period,...

Episode 161 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin explain how to stop work on site without breaching your own subcontract. When a main contractor is weeks late paying, walking off can feel like the only move left, yet it can turn a £100,000 debt into a six-figure liability. Jacob sets out the four routes: statutory suspension under section 112 of the Construction Act, contractual termi...

Episode 160 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin take on statutory interest, the late payment charge almost no UK subcontractor ever claims despite being legally entitled to it. Jacob sets out where the entitlement comes from under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts Act 1998, why every late interim payment is its own qualifying debt, and how the statutory rate of 8% above base compa...

Episode 159 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin work through the ten excuses subcontractors give for not reading their subcontracts, and put a price tag on each one. From "they won't change it anyway" to "it's only a small job", Jacob explains why unread notice periods, liability caps and schedules of amendments quietly decide who gets paid when a job goes wrong. He covers contract f...

In Episode 158 of the Subcontractors Blueprint, Jacob Austin breaks down how the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) is increasing scrutiny on subcontractors working on higher-risk buildings. Jacob explains your legal duties as a contractor duty holder, the critical importance of maintaining thorough records, and how incomplete paperwork can directly block your payments. He also covers the impact on p...

Episode 157 of The Subcontractors Blueprint turns the pre-qualification process on its head. Jacob Austin examines counterparty risk- why main contractors credit check every subcontractor they engage, while subcontractors commit six-figure sums to companies they have never assessed. With 3,827 UK construction firms entering insolvency in the twelve months to March, and insolvency risk still runnin...

In episode 156 of Subcontractors Blueprint , host Jacob Austin wraps up his nine-part dispute series with a powerful message: knowing when not to fight is just as important as knowing how. Jacob walks construction business owners through four essential tests to run before pursuing any dispute — costs, relationship, evidence, and insolvency. He also highlights common mental traps, like pride and su...

Episode 155 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin close the disputes mini-series by mapping the four alternatives to adjudication: mediation, expert determination, arbitration and litigation. Adjudication is still the fastest route to cash on a payment dispute, but it decides one slice of a fight on the law and can turn a working relationship into a war mid-job. Jacob sets out when eac...

Episode 154 of The Subcontractors Blueprint puts a hard number on the sentence Jacob Austin has repeated throughout the disputes mini series: you win on your records, not on being right. Two subcontractors, the same £60,000 of variations, the same genuine entitlement — one walks away with all of it, the other loses half. Jacob breaks down the contemporaneous record keeping habits that decide an ad...

Episode 153 of The Subcontractors Blueprint tackles the gap between winning an adjudication and actually being paid. Jacob Austin walks through construction adjudication enforcement- how a decision becomes a summary judgment in the Technology and Construction Court, why temporary finality means the money moves first and the arguments come later, and how narrow the grounds to resist really are. He...

Episode 152 of The Subcontractors Blueprint flips the disputes mini series on its head with host Jacob Austin: this time the notice of adjudication lands on your desk. This episode on defending an adjudication explains why "the adjudicator got it wrong" is not a defence, and drills into the only two grounds that can stop a referral before the merits are ever reached — jurisdiction and natural just...

Episode 151 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin break down the payment fight every subcontractor faces: smash and grab versus true value adjudication. This instalment of the disputes mini-series shows why your monthly application — not a solicitor — is the biggest lever you hold over a main contractor. When a payment notice or pay less notice is missed, the sum you applied for become...

Episode 150 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin pull apart the mechanics of construction adjudication — how a dispute actually runs from the notice to a binding, enforceable decision. Continuing the disputes mini-series, Jacob shows why the referring party holds the strongest hand in the process, and why that advantage is thrown away by anyone who fires the notice before their case i...

Episode 149 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin tackle crystallisation — the jurisdictional gate every dispute must pass through before it reaches adjudication. Continuing the disputes mini series, Jacob explains why a claim is not a dispute, how the Construction Act lets you refer a dispute only once one actually exists, and why even a watertight claim can be thrown out in its first...

Episode 148 of The Subcontractors Blueprint opens a new mini-series on disputes, with host Jacob Austin mapping the four routes a subcontractor can take when the work is signed off but the payments have stopped. Jacob lays out commercial conversation, statutory adjudication, mediation, and the heavyweight options of arbitration and litigation- what each one costs in pounds and in time, and when to...

Episode 147 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin tackle the difficult commercial conversation — the phone call or meeting where a slashed valuation is either recovered or quietly lost. Jacob Austin explains why a subcontractor's entitlement is only worth what they can actually collect, and why most commercial disagreements are settled in conversation rather than adjudication. Using a...

Episode 146 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin break down one of the most commercially dangerous areas of subcontract management: serving notices- and doing it correctly under JCT and NEC subcontracts. Miss a time bar or serve to the wrong person and you lose your entitlement to time and money- not partially, altogether. Jacob covers both the science- right form, right person, right...

Episode 145 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin examine one of the most common and costly manoeuvres in UK construction — the unlawful omission variation. When a main contractor strips scope from a subcontract and hands it to a competitor, the variation clause is almost never broad enough to make that lawful. This episode breaks down the implied contractual right that protects subcon...

Episode 144 of The Subcontractors Blueprint tackles one of the most misunderstood clauses in construction contracts. Jacob Austin, Quantity Surveyor and host, cuts through the widespread assumption that force majeure offers subcontractors a route to recover soaring material costs — and explains why, in most cases, it does not. Drawing on real contract language across JCT and NEC frameworks, Jacob...

Episode 143 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin confront one of the most expensive commercial blind spots in the industry: the absence of records. Subcontractors are losing money on variations, extensions of time, and contra charges every day — not because they're in the wrong, but because they can't prove they're in the right. Jacob breaks down exactly what records close the gap acr...