FPO

Quality Assurance

Ambia has consistently been at the forefront of firms emphasizing quality improvement. Having seen that application of our proprietary review system significantly reduces change orders, RFIs and construction costs, we decided to offer our industry-leading quality assurance and constructability review program for others.

Key elements of Ambia Constructability Services include:  

  • Formal, tested and established process
  • Proven Design Quality Control/Constructability checklists with over 1500 checkpoints
  • Checklist items based on real design and construction problems
  • Emphasis is on interdisciplinary coordination, often the source of problems
  • Teams composed of management level architects, engineers and contractors *
  • Use of light table overlay system for engineering coordination and dimension checks
  • Back-checks to confirm Review Comment compliance
  • Multi-Check© System adopted by Washington as its Constructability Model

Results have been impressive. Typical A/E caused change orders have been reduced from a mean of 2.9% (the industry average) to an extremely low 0.53%; a 450% reduction! On a $10 million project, this item alone can amount to $217,000 in owner savings. In addition, projects experience an increase in the number of bidders per project, narrower bid ranges and lower bids.

James Brown, Architect, AIA, as the Director of Ambia Quality Assurance, is the leader of the Ambia quality program. Jim has over 35 years of construction and design experience and over 20 years experience as a design quality assurance specialist. He has reviewed approximately $1 billion in construction projects. Also, his copyrighted “Multi-Check Constructability and Design Quality Control”, “Project Management Guidelines” and “Construction Administration Guides for Architects” have improved overall project delivery for many firms. He is known for leading Constructability and Design Quality Control reviews and for the past eight years has taught Quality Assurance, Project Management and Construction Administration Seminars to architectural and engineering organizations, public agencies and private firms.

* Team members can be from Ambia’s experienced group or may be qualified personnel provided by the A/E or Owner