Clients need to be informed in advance of their likely future financial commitments and cost implications as the design evolves. This requires the estimation of building cost based on historic cost data that is updated by a forecasted Tender Price Index (TPI), with the reliability of the...

This study investigates the service quality in the maintenance of mechanical and engineering services. The determinants of service quality are identified and their means of evaluation are examined. A method of assessment is devised based on the SERVQUAL approach, and its use is then illustrated...

This paper is concerned with the effect of outliers on predictions of the probability of tendering the lowest bid in sealed bid auctions. Four of the leading models are tested relative to the equal probability model by an empirical analysis of three large samples of real construction contract...

This paper examines the role and nature of trust in construction project management performance. Three causes, or antecedents, of trust are identified: results, integrity and concern. A questionnaire survey of construction project team members employed by three public sector infrastructure...

The main issues in the philosophical foundations of ethics and tendering ethics are outlined, and an introduction is provided to the Australian codes of tendering practice. A questionnaire survey is then described which sought to ascertain the extent to which ethical behaviour in tendering is...

Recent work on pricing has shown that neoclassical microeconomic theory (NCMT) is preferred to tendering theory and that implied by absorption, or full-cost, pricing of construction work because of its explicit treatment of market conditions, competitor behaviour and firm capacity levels....

This paper is concerned with identifying universal criteria for prequalification and bid evaluation, and the means by which different emphases can be accommodated to suit the requirements of clients and projects. The information, assessment and evaluation strategies currently used by procurers...

Neo-classical microeconomic theory has been suggested to offer (1) an appropriate analytical tool for construction price determination while, at the same time, (2) full-cost pricing is most commonly accepted pricing policy of construction firms. Paradoxically, however, both are mutually...

This paper discusses the content, origin and development of tendering theory as a theory of price determination. It demonstrates how tendering theory determines prices and how it is different from game and decision theories, and that in the tendering process, with non-cooperative, simultaneous,...