CAUSES OF PROJECT DELAYS

LITERATURE REVIEW

Many studies were carried out to investigate and assess the causes of
delays in construction projects. Daniel W M Chan et al (1998) surveyed
the causes of time overruns in Hong Kong construction projects as seen
by clients, contractors and consultants, and examined the factors
affecting productivity. The survey revealed differences in perceptions of
the relative significance of factors between the three groups, indicative
of their experiences, possible prejudices and lack of effective
communication. The results of the research indicate that five principal
and common causes of delays are: poor site management and
supervision; unforeseen ground condition; low speed decision making
involving all project teams; client initiated variation; and necessary
variation of works. Mansfield et al. (19994) studied the causes of delay
and cost overrun in construction projects in Nigeria. The results showed
that the most important factors are financing and payment for
completed works, poor contract management, changes in site
conditions, shortage of material, and improper planning.

David Arditi et al. (1985) studied the reasons for delays in public
projects in Turkey. The results indicate that shortages of some
resources; public agencies and contractors financial difficulties;
organizational deficiencies and delays in design work, frequent change
orders and considerable extra work are the most important sources of
delay.

Assaf et al. (1995) studied the causes of delay in large building

construction projects in Saudi Arabia. The most important causes of
delay included approval of shop drawings, delays in payments to
contractors and the resulting cash-flow problems during construction,
design changes, conflicts in work schedules of subcontractors, slow
decision making and executive bureaucracy in the owners
organizations, design errors , labour shortage and inadequate labour
skills. Mezher et al. (1998) conducted a survey of the causes of delays
in the construction industry in Lebanon from the viewpoint of owners,
contractors and architectural/engineering firms. It was found that
owners had more concerns with regard to financial issues; contractors
regarded contractual relationship the most important, while
consultants considered project management issues to be the most
important causes of delays.

Battaineh (1999) evaluated the progress report of 164 building and 28

highway projects constructed during the period 1996-1999 in Jordan.
The results indicate that delays are extensive: the average ratio of
actual completion time to the planned contract duration is 160.5% for
road projects and 120.3% for building projects.

Al-Momani (2000) conducted a quantitative analysis of construction

delays by examining the records of 130 public building projects
constructed in Jordan during the period of 1990-1997.
The researcher presented regression models of the relationship
between actual and planned project duration for different types of
building facilities. The analysis also included the reported frequencies
of time extensions for the different causes of delays.
The researcher concluded that the main causes of delay in construction
projects relate to designers, user changes, weather, site conditions,
late deliveries, economic conditions, and increase in quantities.

Jonathan J. Shi (2001) presented a paper on method for computing

activity delays and assessing their contributions to project delay. The
method consisted of a set of equations, which could be easily coded
into a computer program that would allow speedy access to project
delay information and activity contributions.

Abdalla M. et al (2001) conducted a study on the causes of

construction delays: traditional contracts from the viewpoint of
construction contractors and consultants.
The results of the survey indicate that owner and consultants agreed
that owner interference, inadequate contractor experience, financing
and payments, labour productivity, slow decision making, improper
planning, and subcontractors are among the top ten most important
factors.

Also, in Mohan R Manavazhi et al (2001), conducted a survey aimed at

firstly ascertaining the occurrence of material and equipment
procurement delays in highways projects in Nepal. An assessment of
the causes of the delays and the magnitude of their impact on projects
costs was also made. The survey method was used in conducting this
research involving 22 highway projects. The main causes of material
and equipment procurement delays were found to be (in rank order)
organisational weaknesses, suppliers defaults, governmental
regulations and transportation delays. Among materials, delays in the
supply of aggregates were found to occur most frequently while delays
associated with pavers occurred most frequently among equipment.

Tommy Y.Lo et al (2005) in their study, construction delays in Hong

Kong civil engineering projects aimed first at gathering the perceptions
of civil construction practitioners on how significant are the causes of
delay; and, second investigating whether the suggestions as stated in
the report of the construction industry review committee are applicable
to and effective at mitigating the corresponding delays with reference
to a ranking order established using the mean score method. The
results of the study showed that the respondents tended to admit their
own failures. A strong consensus was found between the client and
consultant groups on the significance of the various causes of delay.
The consultant and contractor groups held extremely different
perceptions regarding the significance of various delay causes.

In John W. Ralls article on how to avoid delays and delay claims on wind
power projects, it is stated that jobs finish late for all types of
overlapping reasons, including:
1. Inaccurate geotechnical information.
2. Failure to secure needed permits.
3. Late equipment manufacturing.
4. Late equipment deliveries.
5. Design changes.
6. Failure to provide site access.
7. Bad weather.
8. Labour problems
 9. Late or poor performance by installation contractors.
10. Problems with testing and commissioning.
Ogunlana, et al (1996), studied the delays in building projects in
Thailand, as an example of problem faced by the developing
economies. They concluded that problems of the construction industry
in developing economies can be nested in three layers: problem of
shortages of inadequacies in industry infrastructure, mainly supply of
resources, problems caused by clients and consultants; and problems
caused by incompetence of contractors.

Frimpong, et al (2003) studied the factors contributing to delay and

cost overruns in Ghana ground water construction projects. The results
of the survey revealed the main causes of delay and cost overrun in
construction of groundwater projects includes: monthly payment
difficulties from agencies; poor contractor management; material
procurement; poor technical performance; and escalation of material
prices.

Long, et al (2004) studied the problems on large construction projects

in developing countries, a case study from Vetnam .They revealed that
the problems could be grouped under five major factors : incompetent
designers/contractors; poor estimation and change management ;
social and technological issues; site related issues; and improper
techniques and tools.

All the research mentioned have largely focused on Asia. Very few of
the research under this review have concentrated on Africa and only
one has been done on Ghana in the area of groundwater project.
Therefore to the best of my knowledge there has not been much
research on the causes of delay in road construction projects in Ghana.

In the previous research under review, almost all of them used

questionnaire survey in their data collection. However, only a few such
as Tommy Y.Lo et al (2005) and Daniel W.M Chan et al (1998)
considered the correlation or agreement in perception of delay factors
between any two groups of respondents. In this research, a similar
method adopted by W.M Chan et al (1998) will be used.
Murali Sambasivan et al (2006) researched the causes and effects of
delays in Malaysia construction industry. The main purpose of the
study was to identify the delay factors and their impact (effect) on
projects completion. A questionnaire survey was conducted to solicit
the causes and effects of delay from clients, consultants, and
contractors. The study identified ten (10) most important causes of
delay from a list of 28 different causes and six (6) different effects of
delays. The ten most important causes were:
1 contractors improper planning,
2 contractors poor site management,
3 inadequate contractor experiences,
4 inadequate clients finance and payments for completed work,
5 problems with subcontractors,
6 shortages in material,
7 labour supply,
8 equipment availability and failure,
9 lack of communication between parties, and
10 mistakes during the construction stage.

Types of Construction Delays

Construction delay is where project(s) whether in residential or civil engineering is not

completed within the stipulated time frame and is caused jointly or severally by the client,

consultant and consultant.

Construction delays are general costly, since there is usually the use of loans in financing the

project which charges interest involvement of time related charges such as project supervisors

and price increases in wages, materials and equipment hiring.

Before investigating the causes of delays, a clear understanding of the general types of delays is

necessary. There are three basic categories of delay:

1. Excusable-Non-Compensatory (concurrent)

2. Non-Excusable

3. Excusable-Compensatory

Excusable-Non-Compensatory (concurrent): These are types of delays caused by an event or

party outside the control of the client or contractor or consultant. Thus concurrent delays affect

the critical path rather than the float time. Examples of causes are: excessive inclement weather,

labor strikes, riots, etc.

Also, concurrent delays may arise if the client cause delays take place at the same time as a

contractor cause delay. In this, case the contractor is entitled to extension of time without cost. In

a situation where concurrent delays cannot be separated, neither the client nor the contractor can

recover damages for the resulting project delays. Hence, concurrent delays are treated as

excusable but not compensable.

Non-Excusable Delays: These are types of delays where the responsibility is on the contractor.

The events that cause these delays are: insufficient manpower, late material deliveries, lack of

sub-contractor mobilizing, poor management skills, inadequate scheduling etc.

Excusable-Compensatory Delays: These types of delays are determined to be the responsibility

of the client. Examples of causes are: variation orders that impact the critical path, late return of

submittals, or lateness in responding to request for instruction.