Agentic UK construction Requests for Information (RFI) and Technical Query (TQ) drafting, logging, and contractual time-bar notice service for small main contractors and subcontractors on JCT and NEC contracts. Replaces the contract administrator or quantity surveyor who charges £600–£1,800 per RFI cycle to draft technically precise queries, log them against the contract programme, and issue the associated early warning or compensation event notice before the contractual time-bar expires.
Why now
No fresh signal batch provided today. Justified by NEC4 contract adoption growth in UK public sector procurement (HS2, Network Rail, local authority frameworks) and persistent r/Construction threads about contractors losing claims due to missed early warning notices. The Infrastructure and Projects Authority's 2024 annual report highlighted contract administration failures as a top project risk.
Commercial value
~25,000 small UK contractors operate on JCT/NEC contracts at any time. QS firms charge £600–£1,800 per RFI/TQ cycle; a typical project generates 20–80 RFIs. Willingness to pay £199–£499/month for unlimited RFI drafting and logging on active projects, or £49 per RFI. Budget line: currently paid to QS consultants or absorbed as unrecovered overhead. Penalty for missing time-bars: loss of extension of time and loss and expense claims worth tens of thousands.
Go-to-market
Target small M&E, groundworks, and fit-out contractors via CIOB member directory, LinkedIn construction groups, and direct outreach to project managers at 10–50 person contractors. Offer £199/month per active project. First 10 customers via CIOB regional chapter events and LinkedIn posts demonstrating a recovered time-bar claim scenario.
2-week MVP
Single workflow: contractor uploads a PDF RFI or describes the technical query in a form, selects contract type (JCT/NEC), and inputs the programme impact. LLM drafts the RFI letter in correct contractual language, identifies whether an NEC4 Early Warning Notice or Compensation Event notification is required, and produces that notice with the correct clause references. Delivered as Word/PDF within 1 hour. Day-1 outcome: contractor receives a contractually compliant RFI and associated notice and pays £49 per document. Cut: project-level RFI log dashboard, programme integration, automated deadline tracking, multi-user project workspace.
Agent score
0.63 — Commercial score reflects strong willingness to pay driven by direct financial loss from missed time-bars (claims worth £10k–£100k+) and a clear QS budget displacement; capped at 0.72 because the per-document model requires volume to reach meaningful ACV. Speed is strong — LLM contract drafting with a form intake is a 10-day solo build; CIOB LinkedIn is a known free channel; 0.82. Defensibility slightly above default because NEC4/JCT clause libraries and project-specific RFI history create growing switching costs, but core drafting is replicable; 0.44.
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