Commercial
What is a variation?
A variation is a change to the contracted scope of a scaffolding job, priced and invoiced separately from the original quote. In practice most variations on a scaffold are adaptations the client asked for during the hire.
The distinction between a variation and an adaptation is which side of the job you are standing on. An adaptation is the physical change to the structure; a variation is the commercial consequence of it. One scaffold alteration is usually both.
A variation needs an instruction behind it. That is the part that most often does not exist — the request was made on site, verbally, to a squad, and the paperwork that would turn it into money was never raised.
Variations are where scaffolding firms lose most of their recoverable revenue. Not because clients refuse to pay, but because by the time anyone compiles the application, nobody can prove what was done, when, or on whose instruction.
What goes wrong on site
- Work carried out on a verbal instruction with no record of who gave it.
- Variations compiled at the end of the month from memory rather than logged at the time.
- A variation raised against the contract rather than the structure it changed, which makes it harder to evidence later.