Force Account Work

Definition

Force Account Work (also called daywork or time-and-materials) is work executed and paid on the basis of actual resources used — labour hours, equipment time, materials at cost — plus an agreed markup. It is used when scope is too uncertain or too urgent to price as a lump sum or unit rate, and when the owner accepts the cost risk in exchange for fast execution.

When To Use It

• Emergency repairs where waiting for a quote will cause greater damage.
• Discovery work on existing structures (excavation finding unforeseen conditions).
• Owner-directed changes where neither party has time to negotiate unit rates.
• Investigative work supporting change order negotiation.

The Discipline That Makes It Work

• Daily daywork sheets, signed at the close of each shift by an owner's representative.
• Itemized labour by trade, with start/stop times, not just total hours.
• Equipment logs with idle versus working hours separated.
• Material delivery dockets attached to the sheet for that day.
• Agreed rate schedule set before any force-account work begins.
• Photographic evidence for any work that will be buried.

Real-World Construction Example

During a substation refurbishment, the excavator hit an undocumented buried 33 kV cable. The owner directed force-account work to expose, support, and reroute the cable while engineering caught up. Across nine working days, the contractor logged 1,840 labour hours, 312 equipment hours, and $84,000 of material — all on signed daywork sheets, all photographed, all priced against a pre-agreed rate schedule. Invoiced and paid within 30 days with no dispute. The same scope priced as a change order from cold would have taken 6 weeks and a 28% markup.

Real-World IT Analogue

A SaaS implementation partner working on a fixed-price statement encountered an unforeseen data-migration scope. The parties switched the migration scope to a time-and-materials addendum with capped weekly burn and a daily approval requirement. The work completed in eight weeks; the cap was respected; the fixed-price residual carried on undisturbed.

Key Takeaways

• Force account is a fairness mechanism, not a payment loophole.
• Daily records, signed contemporaneously, are non-negotiable.
• Owners accept the cost risk; contractors must run lean and honest.
• Pre-agreed rates remove most disputes.

Expert Tips

• Cap force-account work with a daily or weekly limit; uncapped daywork is where projects bleed.
• Use a different daywork sheet number for each directed change to keep audit trails clean.
• Photograph at start, midpoint, and finish of every day.
• Separate "standing time" from "working time" on equipment logs.
• Refuse to start force account without a written direction; verbal directions evaporate when invoices land.

Common Mistakes

• No daily sign-off; sheets reconstructed weeks later are routinely rejected.
• Mixing force-account and contract work on one timesheet; impossible to reconcile.
• Using daywork to recover lump-sum losses — auditors catch this.
• Forgetting to escalate when daily caps are reached; silent overruns produce loud disputes.
• Missing equipment idle/working differentiation; auditors price the difference against the contractor.
• Treating force-account markup as profit margin; it is meant to cover overhead and small risk.

Practical Lessons Learned

• The signature on the daywork sheet matters more than the rate.
• Force account works when both parties want it to work. Adversarial relationships destroy it.
• The cleanest force-account jobs have the strictest paperwork.

Related Encyclopedia Entries

• Change Order Management
• Job Cost Reporting
• Contingency Reserve
• Procurement Management
• Submittal Management
• Cost Control

Related Research Articles, Case Studies & Tools

• Project Controls Academy: Cost Engineering
• Daywork Sheet Templates
• Learning Tracks: Contracts & Procurement
• Books on Construction Cost Control
• Substation cable rerouting study
• Daywork dispute outcomes