National Development Minister Lawrence Wong on Tuesday (13 June) unveiled plans to pilot a new type of public tender which place greater emphasis on quality over price, reported The Straits Times.
This comes as the property downturn has seen firms bidding at excessively low rates just to win a project.
“Unhealthy price competition can lead to negative consequences for the whole industry… Consultants and contractors who bid very low to get the contract end up having to cut cost, and worse still, cut corners,” said Wong at the annual Building and Construction Authority (BCA) awards ceremony.
To prevent fee-diving among firms, the government will eventually increase the 30 percent weightage currently given to the quality of the consultant or contractor during tender evaluation, he said, without providing a timeline.
Aside from this, agencies will be stricter in penalising firms that fail to deliver to the quality standards, while more weight will be given to those that have adopted new construction technologies, such as virtual design and construction (VDC) and design for manufacturing and assembly (DfMA).
Once implemented, this will provide progressive firms an edge in public sector tender.
Notably, the government has already required the use of DfMA technology in some land sale sites for private developments since 2014.
Moreover, contractors and developers will be required to include their quality scores in their sales documents.
“Greater access to such quality scores will help consumers make more informed choices,” noted Wong.
This article was edited by Denise Djong.
