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Just wondering how other people deal with the inevitable change orders. A lot of changes seem to happen on the fly, and despite our “policy” of written change orders in advance, in reality most minor changes end up being written up after the fact. Nothing like bad experiences to teach good lessons: I am currently finding out that changes that were written up and verbally approved back in August are now the subject of dispute for final payment…. always, always get them signed!!!! Anyways, just curious what experiences, horror stories and wise advice you folks out there may have.
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Change order horror story: Environmental engineering company is digging contaminated soil for a MAJOR oil company (not Chevron, Shell, Arco, Unocal, Texaco, BP, Sunoco, or Sohio). Greater volume than expected. Got a written change order in the field signed by the oil company project manager. Billed them. They refused to pay the change order because that PM only had authority to sign for $100,000, not for the $350,000 incurred. Bunch of slimeballs! Had to write it off.
On the other hand, dealt with a Chevron PM who was great. Something would happen and I'D be arguing we should cover some of it because not everything went perfectly. SHE'D argue they should pay all of it because we still did much better than average. Guess who we'd pursue as a client and bid more competitively to? -David