04/12/2017

Measurement, it is not important anymore!

Uncovering the secrets of measurement

Here’s something that we’ve kept secret over the years. We don’t mind teaching people how to measure properly (if you’re interested that is) to SMM7 standards. You see the thing is the more people that know the better the standard will be in the industry for us all. A bit of an outdated view perhaps? Well what is one of the first things anyone wants when they start to price a job? Why a set of quantities of course? And the thing is it’s getting harder and harder to find people that can actually do it (properly we mean).

So here’s the story.

One of our team a while back did a training session for a contractor for his staff on groundworks. We used a sample of a current job they were looking at as the basis of the session.

Result:

They liked it!

We liked doing it for them!

We taught some junior quantity surveyors and estimators the rudimentary elements of taking off, and they also found some mistakes in the tender they were looking at – we saved them potentially a lot of money as a result!

Everyone was happy!

It’s my favourite topic of all time, measurement, or the apparent lack of it by the RICS in encouraging it to be taught. If you search the RICS website Training Courses section there’s hardly ever anything included for it. Although right now they are offering the ‘purpose, use and benefits of NRM2’ that in our experience, despite its introduction in 2012, hardly anyone in the industry is using! Now how on earth are all new quantity surveyors entering the profession going to know how to deal with things on SMM7? Rely on the Universities? They aren’t really teaching it either! Well not very much in the UK that is.

So for those of you who want a little taster of the sort of thing we can offer, have a look at this Link to our website to find two documents on the basics of how to measure excavation, earthworks and concrete works to SMM7 standards that surprisingly a lot of people use – we hope you find them useful.

To find out more about measurement contact us today.