This clause introduces the two key players from the Client’s “side of the fence”. The Project Manager is the named person within Contract Data part 1 who will administer the contract on behalf of the Client and is the designated authority to issue all instructions, notifications and other communications required under the contract. The Supervisor on the other hand sole responsibility is to check for compliance to the Scope (basically to check for defects, and is independent to the Project Manager). Clause 14.2 makes it clear that the Project Manager or the Supervisor may delegate any of their actions to someone else, but have to do so in writing so the Contractor is clear on who has authority to give instructions or respond to elements issued for acceptance.
Clause 14.1 is also a very important clause, as this confirms that whilst the Project Manager has to accept various contractor submissions, this acceptance does not transfer liability away from the Contractor to provide the works in accordance with the original Scope. In simple terms it means that if there are any errors in the submission that they are not taking on that liability if they accept something. An example would be where if a lower grade of steel than that identified within the Scope is part of a Contractor design. If that gets overlooked within a Contractor’s submission and the Project Manager accepts the design, this lower grade of steel that does not meet the original Scope has NOT been accepted by default. Any issues or liability associated with the steel being inadequate would be retained by the Contractor.
This clause ensures that the Project Manager is not taking on undue liability, and without this clause the Contractor would receive very few “acceptances” as the Project Manager would always be worrying about what they are signing up to. The areas that the Project Manager need to be issuing acceptance for (or not) are covered within these guidance notes. The contract requires in each instance either acceptance or non-acceptance in each case. There is no capacity in the contract for the Project Manager to remain silent, and if they do then that silence would be a reason under 60.1(6) as to being a compensation event, as they have not responded within the contractual timescale.