An Analysis of Causes and Factors Affecting Change Orders Occurrence in Construction Projects in Iraq

Abstract

One of the most important problems facing the construction management process is the occurrence of change orders, which became inevitable in every construction project and the magnitude of these variations varies considerably from project to project. Considerably causing different effects to the project like changes in cost, time, quality, and completion schedule. The objective of this study is analyzing change orders causes related to owner, contractor, consultant and other causes and their effects on project cost for the Kirkuk governorate-Iraq selected as a case study for the purpose of this paper. The Relative Importance Index (RII) methodology was used to analysis the collected data. The case study analysis focused on the selection of 12 construction projects and a questionnaire administered to professionals in the construction industry in Iraq. According to the questionnaire analysis of 40 questions and based on RII ranking was found that the top most ten significant causes of the change orders come to the poor project management in the first rank. Whereas, change in the country’s economic conditions comes in the second rank, contractor’s lack of experience and mistakes during construction stage, poor cost estimation, quality assurance and control, poor performance of contract and subcontractor, the contractor’s financial difficulties, the lack of required skills, unrealistic project durations and design errors and omissions, and finally the collision between contract documents