Florida Construction Law

Budget structures vary by the type of construction a contractor performs. For example, subcontractors typically have a significant amount of their costs allocated to direct labor and materials while general contractors’ budgets are likely to have more subcontracted work on their books. However, despite the differences in where the budget is weighted, every contractor, no matter its specialty, is vulnerable to cost overruns. Weather delays When serious rain, snow or other weather events keep contractors from making progress on their jobs, it’s not uncommon that both subs and GCs have those lost days tacked onto their schedules. But what about the extra costs? “If we get a rain day, it's not like we can send the superintendent home and not pay him,” said Chuck Taylor, director of operations for Englewood Construction in Illinois. “If we have a construction trailer, it's not like we can tell the rental company, 'Hey, it rained today, so we're not going to p...

While it might seem like there are new cases of construction fraud reported practically every week, the good news is that the construction industry is pretty far down on the list of businesses affected by fraudulent acts by employees and subcontractors. Banking and finance, according to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE), followed by manufacturing, government and public administration, health care, retail, insurance, education and energy industries all have more incidents than construction does. The bad news is that even though the construction industry doesn’t lead the pack, it is still impacted significantly by fraud. Angela Morelock, managing partner and forensics expert at BKD LLP in Springfield, Missouri, said that around 6% of annual industry revenue is lost to fraud, so taking into consideration that the U.S. construction industry is an approximately $1.2 trillion-per-year field, that means a significant amount of money is handed over to bad actors ea...

When general contractors or subcontractors sign on to construction projects, they usually start off believing everything will run smoothly. But, during the course of the work, issues sometimes arise that force all parties to go running back to their contracts in order to evaluate their options. One of those options for construction companies is to simply stop work, but contractors need to take care when making such a big decision. “Stopping work and ultimately terminating the contract is one of the most radical things you can do,” said Joseph McManus Jr., attorney and shareholder at law firm Carlton Fields.   Luckily, most of the circumstances under which contractors are clearly entitled to stop work are included in the most popular standard forms of contracts. Nonpayment The most common reason that contractors find it necessary to stop work, McManus said, is that they haven’t been paid for approved invoices. In that scenario, he said, contractors have the ...

The construction industry has the potential to boost its value by an impressive  $1.6 trillion , but companies also face mounting pressures to stay competitive while keeping tight control of rising costs. Manual processes are no longer cutting it, and any organization hoping to reach that potential needs to adopt efficiencies that will enable them to do more work in less time without tacking on a ton of extra overhead. Here are a handful of ways construction companies can modernize their processes and strengthen relationships to increase productivity without adding headcount: Streamline Back Office Processes It’s estimated that employees at construction companies spend 35 percent of their time on “ non-optimal ” tasks, such as searching for project-related information and correcting mistakes. That equates to almost two working days per week that could be better spent on higher priority activities that directly impact profitability instead of rework and repetitive task...

If the human resources experts who we spoke to agreed on anything, it's this: HR departments may be missing the boat if they've waited until now to plan for changes to federal overtime regulations. The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) began the journey to update the Fair Labor Standards Act's (FLSA) salary threshold overtime exemption for certain white-collar professionals an administration ago when it attempted to raise the threshold to $47,476 in 2016. After court battles, a presidential election and then some, employers have now had almost four years to prepare for changes. "The pain point is going to be for employers who don't react appropriately," David Miller, attorney at Bryant Miller Olive, told HR Dive in an interview. "What they need to be doing … is get ready." Miller and other sources echo what legal experts have been saying since  a federal judge enjoined  the Obama administration's update in 2016: Employers need to pre...