The Cost Consultant is uniquely positioned to help the client with Value Management and Value Engineering.

Value Management is where/how the Quantity Surveyor assists the design team through the pre-construction phase of the project with ideas that input into areas such as methods of construction, choice of materials and risk. Sustainability is now key in the construction process and advise not just on the costs but also the benefits and savings on the running costs of the building.

Value engineering involves:

Value engineering is a tool/process that is used to assess design decisions to ascertain whether alternate solutions can be found that reduce costs/time. This should be instigated as soon as possible as the impact of the change bears a direct relation to the costs of the change. The process is fully collaborative and requires complete buy in from the whole design team and client. Firmingers are happy to facilitate this process which will produce significant results in getting the right product at the right price for the client. In a 2 stage tender process the contractor should be brought into the Value Engineering team. The contractor will often add great insight in helping find the correct solution.

Result accelerators:

Value engineering involves identifying the main elements of a product. The Cost Manager will analyse the labour and material elements and look at installation costs, energy costs and life expectancy. Alternate solutions will be assessed to determine what does and what does not add value by allocating costs to each alternative. Changes that are ranked by impact/ease of introduction. The team can then determine which can be introduced to help the client find the best value solution.

Firmingers have the skills and processes to collaboratively engage with the team to get the results required to the ensure that the clients budget is maintained or corrective actions are introduced to bring a tender back to budget.