Payment schedule, Tidewater Dental fit out
Payment schedule
A $184,800 fit out is paid in six milestones, and every one of them is a piece of work rather than a date. The running balance column is the part both sides check, because it falls to zero only when the handover pack changes hands.
The document, page by page
Every page as it renders and as it prints, with nothing summarised. Read the wording before you reuse it.
Section by section
What each section is for, so you can keep the ones you need and drop the rest.
- Cover
- The job, both parties and the contract this schedule attaches to, so the document is never read on its own.
- Headline terms
- Contract sum, milestone count, payment terms and the handover date.
- The schedule
- Six milestones with the share, amount, target date and the balance remaining after each, ending at zero.
- What releases each payment
- Six numbered notes naming the certificate, photograph or sign off that makes a claim valid.
- GST
- The contract sum split into the amount excluding GST, the tax and the total, with the one eleventh rule stated.
- Variations
- Why nothing changes without a signed variation order, and which milestone an approved variation lands in.
- Instead of retention
- The reason no retention is held and where the equivalent protection sits.
- When a payment is late
- Terms, interest, the suspension right, how a disputed amount is handled and what happens when dates slip.
- Claiming a milestone
- Three numbered steps covering the claim email, the three day certification window and when the seven days starts.
- Who may certify
- The named people who can certify for the owner and where claims are sent.
- Execution
- The statement that the contract governs a conflict, and signature blocks for both parties.
Clauses in this document
What makes this document work
The balance column reconciles to zero
Ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty, twenty and fifteen per cent add to one hundred, and the six amounts add to $184,800. Each row shows what is left after it, ending at nil, so neither party has to keep a separate running total.
Every milestone names its evidence
A certificate of compliance, a signed drawing register, dated photographs, a delivery docket. A claim without the named document is not a valid claim, which is stated once and then applied six times.
Retention is replaced by something visible
Rather than holding five per cent of every claim, the schedule makes the final fifteen per cent, $27,720, conditional on practical completion and a closed defects list. The protection is the same size and much easier to argue about.
Questions people ask
What is a payment schedule?
A table setting out when money is payable under a contract, what triggers each payment, and how much is left afterwards. On a construction job it is usually milestone based rather than monthly, so payment follows work rather than the calendar.
Should milestone dates be binding?
The dates here are targets, and the trigger is the work. A milestone reached early can be claimed early, and one delayed by the owner does not move the later dates without a written program revision. That keeps the schedule honest in both directions.
How is GST handled on progress claims?
Every amount in the table includes GST, which is one eleventh of it, so a $36,960 claim carries $3,360 of tax. Each claim is issued as a tax invoice on the day the milestone is certified, and the owner claims the credit in that period.
What happens if a payment is late?
Interest runs at ten per cent a year from the eighth day, and after fourteen days unpaid the builder may suspend on five business days written notice, with the program moving out by the days lost. Disputed amounts have their own five day rule.
What does the schedule use instead of retention?
A defects holdback structured differently, set out in its own section. Retention ties up money for months and is a common source of dispute on small fit outs. Naming the alternative in the schedule, rather than leaving it to the head contract, means both parties priced the same arrangement.
Who is allowed to certify a milestone?
Only the person named in the schedule. This document has a section for it, because a milestone claim signed off by whoever was on site that day is how progress payments go wrong. Naming the certifier at the start gives the contractor one person to chase and the client one point of control.
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