We are an employer using the NEC3 Term Service Contract (TSC). It appears from the contract that there are a couple of ways for the service manager to ask the contractor to carry out additional work – either by issuing a service manager’s instruction or by an option X19 task order. From what we understand, the service manager’s instruction is anything the service manager instructs the contractor to do that makes a permanent change to the service information. For example, the contract says clean block A and B, but the service manager now requests blocks A, B and C to be cleaned going forward. We understand that requests that do not make a permanent change to the service information, for example clean block C once, have to be dealt with as an option X19 task order. However, as the process looks quite long and detailed, is there another method for small one-off works of minimal value?
So, in your example, the service manager can just instruct the contractor to clean block C, either from now onwards or as a one-off job. Equally, if the contract requires blocks A and B to be cleaned once a week, the service manager can instruct that block A is to cleaned twice a week for a couple of weeks. All of these are changes to the service information in the sense that they add something. All can be then be dealt with as compensation events (see clause 60.1(1)), which can be valued by the rate in the price list for such cleaning (see clause 63.1) or, if there is no rate, by calculating the effect on the defined cost plus the fee (see clause 63.2).
Option X19 is designed for more complex project-type work, for example build a new block D. For such work you would require a detailed programme and price before it starts. Option X19 is not intended for every-day, run-of-the-mill reactive maintenance that is needed to operate and maintain the asset that is the affected property