Is It Time to Call Time on Retentions?

For many contractors, retention can feel like an unfair noose around your neck.

The work is complete. Your team has been paid. Your suppliers have been paid. Yet a percentage of the money you’ve already earned can remain tied up for months sometimes much longer.

When you put it like that, it doesn’t seem very fair, does it? Interestingly, retentions aren’t a modern idea. Their use in UK construction can be traced right back to the railway boom of the 1840s, when they were introduced as protection against defective work.

Nearly 200 years later, the Government is now progressing plans to prohibit retention payments under construction contracts, something we would very much welcome.

We believe there’s a better way of achieving what retention was originally designed to do: work closely with the client throughout the project.

Snags shouldn’t suddenly appear on a list at the end of a job. Identify them, discuss them and put them right as you go. It keeps standards high, keeps the client informed and ultimately helps everyone reach completion happy with the result.

Good contractors shouldn’t need thousands of pounds withheld as an incentive to return and put things right.

And removing retention would also mean contractors aren’t effectively financing completed projects with money they’ve already earned… but that’s a huge topic in itself for another day!

Perhaps it’s time retention became a thing of the past.

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