Shash, A A and AbuAlnaja, F M (2023) Causes of material delays in capital projects in Saudi Arabia. International Journal of Construction Management, 23(7), pp. 1109-1117. ISSN 1562-3599
Abstract
Projects in the oil and gas industry are typically accompanied by time extensions, cost overruns, and owners' disappointment. Material delay is one factor for project cost overrun, delays, poor productivity, and compromised quality. This study focuses on factors affecting material availability on capital projects. Twenty-three factors were identified from the literature and experts. These factors were listed in a survey distributed to professionals in Saudi Arabia within the oil and gas industry. Two categorizations were made: the first is based on the cause's impact, and the second is based on the frequency of occurrence of the identified cause. The collected responses were evaluated using the average, standard deviation, relative importance index, frequency index, the frequency adjusted importance index, and the risk matrix. The statistics revealed that the highest three causes in terms of both the frequency and importance are errors in the design and contractual documentation, poor estimation, and inflation of material costs. These results suggest that stakeholders should stress more in developing quality designs and contractual documents. Besides, contractors are recommended to enhance their material cost estimation methods and seriously consider material cost inflation and the fluctuation in material costs during the preparation of their bid prices.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | delay; material management; project performance; Saudi Arabia |
| Index terms: | documents, inflation, overrun, survey, project cost, documentation, relative importance index, cost estimating, statistics, oil and gas, project performance, capital project, estimation, owner, productivity, deviation, cost overrun, Saudi Arabia |
| Subjects: | financial and cost management, strategic project management, economic analysis, data collection methods, risk assessment, mathematical modelling, industry analysis, project controls, sociology, Geography, professional development, project management theory and practice, management, economics |
| Topics: | Risk Management, Stakeholder Management, Cost Management, Business Strategy, Research Practice, Project Management, Geographical Context, Information Management, Time Control |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here