Interface Problems in Change Order-Challenged Projects

Abstract

Change orders are among the main sources of problems challenging timely completion of construction projects. The significantly needed conducive interaction among project participants to mitigate completion delay risk due to change orders is often hampered by interface problems. This article describes potential sources of interface problems and their role in affecting completion time of change order-challenged infrastructure construction projects in Indonesia. The identified sources then serve as inputs to formulate a systems thinking model of relational interface problems in change order-challenged projects. A survey of eleven important infrastructure construction projects was conducted to obtain data on the main sources of these interface problems and their severity indexes. A second survey was later conducted to perceive the most frequent causes of change orders, the influence of interface problem cause factors on the length of change order process and the influence of interface problem cause factors on the expediting capacity of a project team and ultimately induce a delay of project completion. The results of both surveys then served as inputs to a systems thinking structure showing the factors in a change order-challenged project. The study shows that contract, technical experience, management, coordination and financial aspects are the potential sources of interface problems in Indonesian infrastructure construction projects. In a change order-challenged project, these interface problems' sources will complicate the efforts to achieve the project's time objective. The study especially points out the role of contract documents' quality in increasing the likelihood and extent of change orders and the influence of workers' productivity in mitigating the negative impact of a change order.

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“…Table 2 lists the projects and respondents involved in the questionnaire survey. A part of the survey's result (from five among the 11 projects) was already described in a previous article (Marzuki, Oktavianus and Regina, 2018). For the present article, the numbers of respondents are increased and the types of infrastructure constructed are more varied to obtain a more complete representation of Indonesian infrastructure construction projects.…”

“…Meanwhile, Chen, Reichard and Beliveau (2008) identify comprehensive cause factors of interface problems from six interrelated perspectives: people/participants, methods, processes, resources, documentation, project management and environment. Marzuki, Oktavianus and Regina (2018) conducted a research on interface problems in Indonesian infrastructure construction projects mainly based on cause factors categorisation proposed by Al-Hammad (2000) and Chen, Reichard and Beliveau (2008).…”

“…Table 4 shows interface problem factors found in the projects based on respondents' perception obtained through interviews. As in the previous study conducted by Marzuki, Oktavianus and Regina (2018), the factors are classified into six categories, namely contract, management, technical experience, coordination, financial and environment. The factors are a combination of those proposed previously by Al-Hammad (2000) and Chen, Reichard and Beliveau (2008).…”

Second-order confirmatory factor analysis model for estimating the overall risk of change orders in road projects

“…The second highest factor in-group score was the factor “differing site conditions” which had a score of 0.668. This factor was ranked second in the study from Senouci et al (2017) in Qatar; ranked sixth in the study from Muhammad et al (2015) in Nigeria; and identified as one of the key causes in the study from Hansen et al (2020) in Indonesia; and the most common cause of change orders in construction projects in Indonesia according to Marzuki et al (2019). While taking into consideration the group score, it comes in tenth place.…”

Construction Change Order Management Project Support System Utilizing Delphi Method

“…define change order as "modifications or alterations to pre-existing conditions, assumptions, or requirements". Change orders (also known as variation orders) are common in construction (Shrestha & Fathi, 2019;Kermanshachi et al, 2018;Shrestha & Maharjan, 2018;Marzuki et al, 2019;Du et al, 2016;Alleman et al, 2020;Khanzadi et al, 2018). Change order is inevitable aspect of construction industry and also one of the important factors in the failure of projects (Keane et al, 2010;Kermanshachi et al, 2020).…”