You’ve received a subcontract you don’t like the look of.
From a summary commercial risk assessment through to a full clause-by-clause review, proposed wording and practical mobilisation information.
Commercial problem-solving for UK subcontractors
Commercial problems sensibly solved.
Specialist off-site QS support for UK subcontractors.
Subcontract / clause 17.4.2
“…all loss, damage, expense and liability incurred by the Contractor under this and any related contract…”
Margin note / check exposure
What matters first
Is this contract worth spending a week on?
Before anyone marks up forty clauses, find out whether the commercial position is even negotiable.
Off-site support
Focused. Practical. Proportionate.
Start with the problem. We’ll work out the most sensible level of support.
Commercial support
The work we’re usually brought in for.
Focused commercial support for the jobs that need judgement, concentration and a clean answer.
A variation has turned into an argument.
Entitlement, evidence, chronology and the commercial story — packaged so someone else can understand it without living through the project.
You’ve got an EOT entitlement but no time to build the submission.
Delay chronology, notices, programme impact, records and the practical explanation that ties them together.
You’re near the end and the numbers are drifting apart.
Reconciliation, outstanding variations, entitlement review, contra charges and a defendable route to agreement.
Your commercial team is drowning at exactly the wrong moment.
Focused off-site support for the jobs that need finishing properly — without buying another person for every meeting and WhatsApp group.
It’s commercial. It’s awkward. It doesn’t have a tidy name.
Good. Those are often the interesting ones. Send us what you’ve got and tell us what you’re trying to achieve.
If a four-hour commercial check is enough, we’re not going to turn it into a five-day review.
Contract review
Clarity before clause-count.
Before anyone spends days reviewing every clause, it makes sense to establish the commercial position first: what’s workable, what’s risky, what needs negotiating, and what genuinely deserves a deeper review.
The contract says
“The Subcontractor shall be liable for all loss, expense, liability and consequential exposure incurred by the Contractor under this or any related contract…”
What it actually means
Your exposure may have very little relationship to the value of your own package.
That is a commercial decision first. If the client won’t negotiate the mechanism, there may be little value in spending days perfecting the rest of the document.
Field Tools / Coming soon
Small tools for subcontract-side problems that keep coming back.
We’re building a small collection of focused tools around subcontract-side problems we’ve repeatedly encountered ourselves over the years — the sort of jobs that don’t need a full software platform, but do need doing properly.
If you face issues getting materials-on-site claims paid; turning verbal instructions into written agreements; or getting a job financially closed out because the snag list never seems to end — join the list and we’ll let you know when the first tools go on sale.
Register your interest →
Works offline
Designed for the places site work actually happens — signal optional.
Your data. Your device.
No cloud storage required for the working data.
No AI processing
Your commercial information isn’t sent away for AI processing.
No subscriptions
No recurring software bill just to keep using it.
Why off-site
Being off-site isn’t a compromise. It’s the whole point.
The work we offer is deliberately centred on commercial tasks that benefit from uninterrupted time, focused analysis and a clear return date.
01
High-focus work benefits from uninterrupted time.
Contract reviews, claims and evidence packs are easier to do properly away from the day-to-day noise of site.
02
You buy the piece of work, not our presence.
If the job is “finish this properly by Friday”, that is what the service is built around.
03
Your site team keeps doing site work.
We work with the information they already have, ask for what is missing, and deal with the concentrated commercial task away from the interruptions.
04
Off-site by default, not inaccessible.
Where it genuinely helps, we can attend an initial briefing, handover or one-off meeting. What we’re not offering is routine site cover or day-to-day project presence.
About
Subcontract-side experience, put to practical use.
The Offsite QS is built around practical commercial judgement, not generic consultancy language.
Experience behind the work
20+
years of subcontract-side construction commercial experience behind the way we work.
The contract is only part of the picture.
We’ve spent years working on the subcontract side, so we tend to look beyond the wording itself and ask what it means for the job in the real world. What needs doing, who needs to know, where things are likely to go wrong, and which points genuinely deserve attention.
That practical context shapes the way we work. We focus on the issues that can affect payment, entitlement, evidence and decision-making — and on simplifying complicated commercial requirements into something people can actually use.
Caroline Payton · The Offsite QS
Contact
Start with what you need.
Tell us what’s happening, what you’re trying to achieve, and anything useful we should know. If it’s easier to talk it through, leave your number in the message and we’ll give you a call.
Field Tools
Register your interest
What are Field Tools? →