The History of the Bill of Quantities

The history of the Bill of Quantities

Historically, the formal Bill of Quantities (BoQ) was introduced in Britain after the Industrial Revolution in the 1800s. It was mainly used by tradesmen to pay their workers and to request payments from clients by submitting interim measurement claims against the BoQ. The BoQ is still widely used across many Commonwealth countries  such as Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Hong Kong, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Kenya and Middle Eastern countries, especially in traditional procurement. The BoQ is used primarily for cost estimating and, even more importantly, as part of the tender documents so that equivalent competing bids can be requested from contractors. The BoQ then becomes binding and is ranked in the contract together with the other tender documents as the final contract is formed. 

The Bill of Quantities is a central document in many construction and civil engineering projects. It is used by clients, architects, engineers, consultants and contractors throughout the construction process. The BoQ is used, for example, in project cost management, a key part of project management. Cost processes include estimating, cost planning, cost monitoring and cost control.

For contractors, every construction project involves tendering, resource planning

(money, materials, labour, plant), work planning and execution, subcontract procurement, supervision,

monitoring and control. Access to a BoQ, prepared either by the project owner’s designer/quantity consultant or by the contractors themselves, gives contractors the information they need to run project management processes more efficiently and purposefully.

This information is also important for preparing project budgets and cash flows, calculating the quantities required to deliver the project, planning labour and related requirements, payment claims and contracting subcontractors.

For clients, the main interest is to see their projects completed on time, within the estimated

cost and to the specified quality. In today’s environment, more project owners also want better information about their

projects and reliable updates on progress and the commercial aspects of the project. 

The costs or commercial information in a priced Bill of Quantities can be translated into cash flows, periodic project accounts and cost variation within the project. That information can then be communicated to owners so they stay informed about project progress and financial position.

Since the 1800s, the processes for handling payment between the parties have become more complex. Rules have been added for how quantities should be calculated, along with reference literature explaining how measurement and payment rules should be interpreted. The aim is fairness and comparable tenders: everyone should calculate in the same way. In Sweden this includes frameworks such as AMA (the Swedish technical specification system) and MER (Swedish measurement and payment rules linked to AMA).

We have now taken a step to simplify and streamline the process for payment and measurement between the parties in construction and civil engineering projects. By using our Construction Contract Intelligence platform, you get better cost and revenue control, clearer cash-flow visibility, and traceability of documentation linked to the Bill of Quantities and quantity measurement and valuation.

Get in touch if you want to know more.

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