The plague of many construction customers is
the change order. Once a job gets underway, the original construction budget
begins to inflate from unforeseen circumstances. The customers must seek a
change order, which raises their costs. Sometimes it is the contractor who
claims an unpredicted problem has been found and that merits extra payments
through a change order. The resolution of change orders is often a testy
affair and it is sometimes a good way to judge the good faith operations of
a contractor. Do they try and "hold up" the customer over change orders? Are
they nit-picking a job, looking for excuses for change orders to inflate an
originally "low-balled" bid?This type of information is often difficult
to find. For this reason, The Critic has requested documents regarding
Buckeye Electric’s public works jobs, in part to review whether their jobs
have been tainted by numerous change orders. These records also reveal
whether Buckeye Electric has always performed its construction tasks in a
timely and efficient manner.
The Critic recently reviewed thousands of pages of records regarding
Buckeye’s work at the Miami University Culinary Support Center and also at
the State of Ohio’s Emergency Response Center and at Ohio State. Here is a
record of some of the change orders that popped up on these Buckeye jobs.
MIAMI UNIVERSITY
A November 1, 2000 Miami University memo, written just six months after
Buckeye had been awarded the bid of $536,700 for work at their Culinary
Support Center, showed that Buckeye Electric’s contract had already begun to
inflate, with $67,364 in change orders already tallied. That is a 12%
increase. Some –or all– of that increase, was because of errors and
omissions that may have had nothing to do with Buckeye. For instance, over
$26,000 of this budget increase, which was documented in Change Order 28-04,
was an "owner’s request," but these figures illustrate how a bid number
scale. All of the apprentices came from the Associated Building Contractors
(ABC) program.
Here are some details on several other large change-orders for Buckeye
Electric’s job at Miami University:
Change Order #4 Conduit and Connections for the Dock Levlors $ 6,324
Change Order #6 Circuit Breaker $ 309
Change Order #8 Floor Boxes $ 650
Change Order #12 Panel Feeder and Conduit with Hangers $ 10,502
OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY
Buckeye Electric received a contract for $59,800 for electrical work at
Ohio State’s hospital electrically operated entrance door. However, the ink
was barely dry on the contract before a $15,183 change order surfaced,
increasing the cost of the job by 25%.
Buckeye Electric’s work at the Fisher College of Business brought with it
change orders of $753 for work on an overhead door keypad, release of night
security doors for $3366 and another $7000 in change orders for other
modifications in the original contract.
EMERGENCY OPERATIONS CENTER
Change order #076-405 was for added cabling and cost the State another
$6,831 on this Buckeye Electric job.
Change order #077-405 was for added exit lights that were required by
code, special "wet" lights for the showers and other changes.
CULINARY CENTER, CENTRAL FOOD STORE/CREDIT UNION JOBS,
MIAMI UNIVERSITY DELAYS BY BUCKEYE
Meeting minutes for this job, dated May 30, 2000, state that "All prime
contractors owe [the General Contractor] their individual line items so he
can finished the overall schedule. Waiting for Buckeye Electric to
respond." According to the minutes for both June 6 and June 13, Buckeye
had still not responded.
