The risk to architects of specifying standards needs to be managed. Proprietary specification systems such as NATSPEC regularly review all standards to ensure that they are appropriate for inclusion in the master specification. However, it is still necessary for the architect to ensure these are appropriate for the particular project.
To help protect architects from liability for certifying work that is not in accordance with the standards, a clause may be inserted in the contract documents, stating that the contractor bears full responsibility for compliance with the standards specified and called up by the National Construction Code (NCC), and must certify on completion that it has complied with the standards. In some states the requirement for a contractor's certificate is covered by state building acts.
Other possible measures include:
- the insertion of a clause in the Client and Architect Agreement that in certifying payment, the architect does not warrant nor represent compliance with all possible standards; and
- insertion of a clause in an architect and subconsultant agreement that the subconsultant is required to check compliance with all standards relevant to their discipline.
Consideration should be given to including checkpoints in the architect's quality-management system procedures for:
- initial allocation of prime responsibility for the observance of standards; and
- verification that each of the various parties has provided the required certification of compliance.
Architects cannot avoid responsibilities placed on them by the mandatory inclusion in their documentation of the standards referenced by the NCC; however, beyond such inclusions they can be selective in their use of other standards by calling up only those standards that are particularly relevant to the project.
Architects are sometimes asked to certify that a design complies with the requirements of the NCC. Refer related note: Requests for issuing certificates
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