‘Preliminaries’, or more accurately ‘Preliminaries and General Conditions’, is the term used to describe those things which apply to the whole of the work, including, but not exclusively, overall performance, standards, restrictions, approvals, communications, documentation, testing and completion. It also includes a description of the work itself, lists of participants, drawings and other documents associated with the work.
‘Preliminaries’ will usually contain a description of the form of contract to be used. This is important because it will affect the processes and procedures throughout the job, and the language used in the specification. For example, a design and build contract will differ significantly from a ‘traditional’ one, while there are some fundamental differences in terminologies between contracts issued by different publishers: some use the terms ‘Employer’, ‘Architect/ Contract Administrator’, ‘Contractor’, while others may use ‘Client’, ‘Building Owner’, ‘Engineer’, ‘Supervisor’, ‘Supplier’ and the like. Similarly, operational procedures can vary across contracts.
For a list of the contracts supported with preliminaries in the platform, please see the scope and contents on theNBS.com/NBS-Chorus.
More importantly, many of the contracts for which the Preliminaries sets exist are designed to operate in different jurisdictions. We produce Preliminaries sets for contracts used throughout the UK and Ireland, as well as internationally, and in some of those locations there are significant differences to things like prevailing law, development control, local standards and building regulations.
This means that while some of the Preliminaries content can be generic, and apply in all cases, the remainder has to be specific to reflect the particular circumstances under which the work is carried out.
Starting a new Uniclass Preliminaries document
This video explains how to start a Uniclass Preliminaries document.
Beginning your preliminaries by selecting 'General information'
At early stages of a project or when you are unsure about the method or procurement you may not know which contract preliminary to choose.
In the platform this is resolved by having two parts to the Preliminaries content; firstly, content you can access and edit without choosing a contract.
By selecting General Information when setting up the document only the sections which are relevant for all contracts will be added.
UK - Uniclass Preliminaries
The Australian and UK Uniclass preliminaries are slightly different. In the 'UK - Uniclass Preliminaries', selecting General Information brings in these sections only:
PM 10 – Project information
PM 30 – Site, ground and environmental information
PM 35 – Project performance requirements
PM 40 – Design and approvals information
PM 50 – Financial and commercial information
RO – Roles
This content is broadly equivalent to that in the following project management sections in NBS Create:
00-05-10 Project definition
00-05-15 Works terminology
00-05-20 Project participants
00-05-70 Project location
00-30-70 Works contract procurement
05-20-60 Whole building performance
Beginning your preliminaries by selecting a contract (UK only currently)
By contrast, if you select the title of a contract when you set up the document, the platform will add the full list of sections you need to complete for that contract. This will include the sections from above, that are relevant to all contracts AND the contract specific sections.
Selecting the title of a contract brings in all of the sections you need to complete:
PM 10 – Project information
PM 30 – Site, ground and environmental information
PM 35 – Project performance requirements
PM 40 – Design and approvals information
PM 50 – Financial and commercial information
PM 55 – Contract information
PM 60 – Construction management information
PM 70 – Testing, commissioning and completion information
PM 80 – Asset management information
RO – Roles
Key:
Common to all contracts
Specific to each contract
This, in turn, reflects the content which was previously found in NBS Create sections 00-40-70 to 00-80-70.
It is also important to remember that the two parts must be included to produce a full set of Preliminaries.
Australia - Uniclass Preliminaries
The Australian and UK Uniclass preliminaries are slightly different. The Australian content set is relatively new (first released in July 2020) and will be developed in phases.
The 'Australian - Uniclass Preliminaries' sections apply to all contracts. Selecting General Information brings in these sections only:
PM 10 – Project information
PM 30 – Site, ground and environmental information
PM 35 – Whole project performance requirements
PM 40 – Design and approvals information
PM 50 – Financial and commercial information
PM 55 – Contract information (in development)
PM 60 – Construction management information
PM 70 – Testing, commissioning and completion information
PM 80 – Asset management information
RO – Roles
Please note PM_55 is in development and has not been released yet.
Key:
Common to all contracts
Specific to each contract