The Never-Ending Closeout
Projects don’t always fail during delivery. Sometimes, the damage is done at the finish line, when final accounts drag on for months – or even years. By then, margins are tied up in disputes, cash flow is frozen, and teams have already moved on to new projects.
Where does it go wrong?
- Incomplete records from the delivery phase.
- Variations not fully captured or agreed during the job.
- Claims submitted without proper substantiation.
- Clients holding back payment leverage to settle disputes cheaply.
The Root Cause
Final accounts aren’t painful because they’re complex. They’re painful because commercial discipline during delivery was weak. The data isn’t there, the evidence is patchy, and negotiations drag because neither side trusts the numbers.
A real-world example:
On a £120m project, the contractor took 18 months to close the final account. £4m in claims were eventually written off – not because they weren’t valid, but because the records to support them simply didn’t exist.
Proactive Beats Reactive
The best commercial teams:
- Keep final account logs updated in real time, not after completion.
- Agree variations progressively, not in bulk at the end.
- Audit records throughout delivery so nothing is missing when it matters.
- Treat closeout as a parallel process, not an afterthought.
Final Thought
Final accounts don’t need to drag on. With the right systems, they can be closed quickly, fairly, and profitably. The longer they take, the more profit you lose.
