QScope

Written for the people who value the work

Payment, valuation, variations, retention and the final account. 174 pieces, no sign-up, and no piece that ends in a sales pitch.

Latest

Worker in a hi-vis vest using a laptop at a desk with a small red house model
Reports09/07/2026
How often to report, and what changes when you do

Monthly is the default and it is usually right. What matters more is that the report says what moved since the last one, and why.

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Overhead view of hands drawing on a house floor plan with a ruler
Construction Act09/07/2026
When termination goes wrong and turns on the party that gave it

A termination made without proper grounds, or without following the procedure, can itself be a repudiatory breach. The other side can accept it and claim damages. Getting the ground and the process right is the whole game.

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Two workers in hard hats with drawings in a window opening of a concrete house
Retention08/07/2026
How much retention can they hold from my payments?

There is no legal maximum and no standard figure to fall back on. Where the percentage comes from, what you will actually meet, and what twenty one thousand pounds of difference looks like on one job.

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Open notebook, pencils and tape measure on a wooden table
Reports07/07/2026
What to put in a building quote so there is no argument in six months

Every dispute page in this series has the same footnote: it depends what you wrote at the start. This is the page about the start. Nine things a quote needs, none of them legalese, and the two clauses builders write for themselves that backfire.

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Surveyor in a hard hat with a clipboard beside a theodolite on a housing site
Reports06/07/2026
Handing a job to another surveyor

Most of what a surveyor knows about a project is not in the file. A handover that transfers only documents transfers about half of it.

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Tired worker in an orange hard hat wiping his brow beside a colleague on a ladder
Time & completion02/07/2026
The supplier delivered late and the job stood still. Who pays for that?

Upwards: you do, because your supplier’s failure is your risk, not the client’s, and no extension of time list covers it. Downwards: maybe the supplier, if the order terms allow it, and merchant terms are written so they mostly do not.

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Rolled plans, tape measure, dividers and colour swatches on drawings
Construction Act01/07/2026
He missed the deadline to dispute my payment. Can I just claim the lot?

Yes, and the route has a name: a smash and grab adjudication enforces the notified sum without anyone valuing the work. What makes the claim stick, what the client can do next, and why the money is usually yours to hold but not always yours to keep.

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Orange tape measure lying on a technical drawing
Construction Act30/06/2026
Which figure do they actually have to pay?

The notified sum is the figure that becomes payable under the Construction Act, whoever thinks the work was worth something else. Where the number comes from, how a pay less notice changes it, and why none of this exists on a job for someone living in the house.

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Hand on a calculator with a tape measure, gloves and hard hat on drawings
Reports29/06/2026
Conflicts of interest, and the ones you do not notice

The obvious ones get declined. The damaging ones develop quietly on a project that started out perfectly clean.

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