No abstract

The duties and responsibilities of the parties signing a contract are governed by the previously agreed terms of the contract. General conditions are a standardized form of pre-printed contract which specifies the general project rules and relevant commercial terms. The contracts are developed and published by various associations and professional bodies and are widely used in the construction industry. In the Malaysian construction industry, there are several standard forms of main contracts and nominated subcontracts. However, for a domestic subcontract, the main contractor prefers to use a bespoke contract, which results in contract disputes. Drafting a complex contract can be time-consuming and expensive. It also requires the involvement of the legal team to provide legal opinions and advice on its content. Hence, this study intends to identify domestic subcontract attributes and critical conditions to overcome the major issue of unclear terms and conditions for the domestic subcontract. A set of attributes and critical conditions have been established through a detailed review and analysis of twenty-two (22) bespoke contracts collected from the industry and an extensive literature review from published articles. Content analysis was done on leading academic journals in construction engineering and management. Clarity, consistency, parties, risk, language, and format of the domestic subcontract are some of the attributes. Meanwhile, payment, liquidated damages, delay, subcontract sum, termination, variation order, practical completion and defect liability period, commencement and completion, and safety provision are the most crucial conditions discovered through extensive review and content analysis of the bespoke contracts. The advantage of establishing these characteristics and critical conditions is that they serve as a prerequisite for the development of a domestic subcontract framework

In construction industry, almost every construction project has to deal with construction contract, due to the project complexity and high financial risk. The contracts are developed and published by various associations and professional bodies and are widely used in the construction industry. Contract conditions are intended to specify the duties and rights of the contractual parties and must be properly drafted. Contractual parties under a particular contract must be aware of the details of the contract conditions. In Malaysian construction industry, there are several standard forms of main contracts and nominated subcontracts. However, for domestic subcontract, main contractors prefer to use bespoke contract, which the parties modify the standard contracts by omitting several clauses or adding new clauses; thus, potentially compromise the completeness and accuracy of the contract. Hence, the aim of this study is to examine the crucial conditions in the domestic subcontract commonly approached by main contractor in construction projects. A quantitative research method is adopted and the data have been collected by survey questionnaires. There are a total of 100 valid responses received from the construction industry practitioners in Malaysia. The survey objective is to rank the conditions in domestic subcontract from the most to the less important. As the result, the top 5 of relatively important domestic subcontract conditions, out of 27 conditions, are the terms of payment and final account, extension of time, variation, contractor’s and subcontractor’s obligations, and performance bond. The results of these surveys will enhance the contractual knowledge of main contractor and domestic subcontractor and improve awareness of crucial conditions that are prerequisite for the development of domestic subcontract.

Misconduct often happens in the construction industry because of its scale, complex contract structure, competitive and fragmented nature. It leads to an unethical issue. The unethical issues and the impacts hindered the development of the construction industry in Malaysia and affected the national growth development. As the construction industry is now moving forward to the 4th industrial revolution, it is worth investigating whether the adoption of digital transformation can make some changes to the unethical issues in the Malaysian construction industry. This research paper aims to examine the construction players' perception of the usage of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in reducing the unethical issues in the Malaysian construction industry. A quantitative research method is adopted and the data is collected by a questionnaire survey. There were a total of 101 responses received from the construction industry practitioners in Malaysia. Data collected was analysed by reliability test and descriptive test for further evaluation and analysis. The finding shows the usage of BIM through its function of 3D project visualization, clash detection, better communication flow, and centralised single repository data storage are potentially reduced unethical issues. This research provides a better understanding to the construction industry practitioners on the possibility of BIM implementation as a potential tool in reducing unethical issues in the construction industry.