As Employer’s Agent, Quantity Surveying, and Client CDM Advisor, Tetra Tech has supported Sigma since 2015 in delivering 70 phases of roughly 5,000 houses totaling £600m across the North West of England.
Challenges
From Yorkshire and the Midlands to London, Scotland, and Wales, Sigma’s framework marks an ambitious endeavor to bring to market a mix of two-, three-, and four-bedroom houses alongside a number of apartment schemes. All dwellings are for private rented schemes.
Spread far and wide, this framework imposed the challenge of a significant volume of units to be handed over at any one time.
Solutions
To tackle the large national footprint, our approach in providing EA/QS services has been to use regional resources based on the geography of projects for day-to-day delivery, whilst maintain overall control, governance, and client interface in the north west.
A collaborative, flexible, and hardworking approach has underpinned the efforts of Tetra Tech’s surveyors as they have teamed up with Sigma’s Development Managers on a regional basis. Monthly high-level meetings have taken place between the contractor, the client’s directors, and our Head of Practice and Associates.
Each phase has had its own Employer’s Agent, responsible for running the project and contract administration. Reports and valuations have been produced monthly to update on issues for each site.
To deal with the large volume of units, weekly meetings chaired by Tetra Tech have taken place with the client and contractor covering progress, quality, and design.
At high-level monthly meetings with representatives of the client, contractor, and lettings agents, our experts have worked closely with these stakeholders to ensure proper procedure for handing over units in the phases agreed with the contractor.
Outcomes
Through regular meetings with the client and contractors, we are proud to have enabled a quicker response to problems and given a clearer overview of the frameworks at any one time. Many sites have benefitted from support by Homes England, and consequently, our role has been extended on these sites to also pick up the fund monitoring role for Homes England under a separate appointment.
“Sigma’s team has been extremely pleasant to work with. They are an intelligent and informed client who we’ve been able to have open and frank discussions with to address issues that have arisen. We are proud to have lent our expertise to ensure that the houses not only achieve the utmost cost efficiency but also achieve the purpose they are designed to fulfill according to their specifications.” – Jon Mainwaring, Head of Practice, Cost Consultancy.
