Problems Associated with Delay Analysis Methodology in Malaysian Construction Delay Practice

Delay to progress of a construction project is a major source of claims and disputes in the construction industry. At the heart of the matter in dispute often the subject of the degree of each contracting party’s responsibility for the delayed project completion. Therefore, various delay analysis methodologies have been developed over the years as aids to answering this question. However, to date lack of research on the extent of use of these methodologies in practice to have been done in Malaysia although it has many studies done in this subject area. This paper is an attempt to fill that gap. The aim of this paper is to identify the problems affecting the use of these methodologies in practice. A survey approach using questionnaire as an instrument was employed to achieve the aim of this study. An extensive of the literature review was conducted. The study only involves the contractors and the clients’ consultants. The findings from the survey revealed that “poorly updated programmes”, “lack of familiarity with the techniques”, “lack of skills in using technique”, “unrealistic baseline programme”, and “baseline programme without CPM network” were the top five (5) problems on the use of delay analysis methodologies. This seems to suggest that the sophisticated methodologies are not widely used mainly due to a number of problems related to improper programming and lack of skills and familiarity in using the methodologies.