Construction Act
He missed the deadline to dispute my payment. Can I claim the lot?
No payment notice, no pay less notice, and the final date has passed. On a job the Construction Act covers, the law’s answer is blunt: the sum in your application became the sum due, whether or not it was right. Here is how to collect it, and the counterpunch to expect.
QScope Team·1 July 2026·6 min read
First, confirm the three facts this whole claim stands on, because it is procedural from top to bottom:
- Your application was valid: made under the contract, on the right day, to the right person, stating the sum and how it was calculated. If this is shaky, start at is my invoice a payment application, because every weakness in the application is the client’s whole defence.
- No payment notice arrived in its window, so your figure became the notified sum.
- No pay less notice arrived in its window either (section 111), so nothing reduced it.
All three true? Then the notified sum was payable in full by the final date, and the client’s opinion of your valuation is legally irrelevant to this cycle. That is not a loophole; it is the design. The Act decided that cash flows on paperwork, and arguments happen afterwards.
Collecting it: the smash and grab
If the letter and the deadline do not produce money, the route is adjudication under section 108, and this particular kind has a nickname: a smash and grab. The adjudicator is not asked to value the work, only to check the paperwork: valid application, no notices, final date passed, pay. Because the question is narrow, these adjudications are fast and hard to defend, and the decision is enforceable through the courts on the “pay now, argue later” principle.
The counterpunch: a true value adjudication
The client’s recognised answer is to start their own adjudication on the true value of the work, and generally they must pay the notified sum first before that route is open. If the true value comes out lower, the difference comes back off, in that decision or in the next cycle, because interim valuations are cumulative and the account corrects itself as it goes.
The practical consequence: claim the lot when the lot is roughly right. A deliberately inflated application collected through a smash and grab is money you will hand back with costs and a burnt relationship attached. The tactic is at its best when the client simply went to sleep on a fair application, which is most of the time.
On a job for someone living in the house
None of this machinery exists on a contract with a residential occupier: section 106 takes the whole Act away, so there is no notified sum, no missed-notice consequence and no adjudication. A homeowner who ignored your invoice has simply not paid a contract debt, and the route is the ordinary ladder ending in a letter before action and the county court.
What to do this week
1. Audit the three facts against the contract and the calendar, in writing, before threatening anything.
2. Send one letter naming the mechanism: the sum notified, the notices that did not arrive, the final date passed, payment within seven days.
3. If it stays unpaid, take advice on adjudicating. A clean smash and grab is one of the cheapest disputes to run, see what recovery actually costs, but the referral has to be drafted precisely, and a construction solicitor or claims consultant will earn their fee here.
Where the information stops
Whether your application was valid on its facts is the entire case, and it is a document question a professional should check before you rely on it. And whether to collect an inflated sum you may later repay is a commercial judgement this page will not make for you.