Legal advice on a technical specification

[rob900]

Hello.
Firstly sorry this question is a bit long winded. I have tried my best to keep it as succinct as possible.

A small IT project (part of a larger contract our company was awarded in Sept 09) has turned into a large IT project and is causing us some contractual problems.
The specification for this particular part of the project simply stated that our equipment needs to be able to pass data to some 3rd party hardware.
At the time of signing the contract, we had no visibility on the interfacing requirement of the 3rd party equipment (except for the physical connection).
At this stage we should have requested more information or declined to quote – hindsight being a wonderful thing…
Having finally obtained the specification for the interface in November 2009, and evaluated the task, we found that we have no choice but to commission a programmer to write special interfacing software, as the 2 systems do not share a common interface protocol. It’s a bit like trying to connect a typewriter to a washing machine.
This is of course expensive and any marker we had in place for these additional costs will be totally inadequate.
We are trying to make a case to our client that because details of the interface were not made available to us until after we had signed the contract, that we have grounds to justify additional costs to cover the work.
However our client simply refers us back to the one line specification and asks if there has been any variation from it.
Certainly the task description has not changed, but how we now solve the problem has escalated as described.
My question is, do we legally have any grounds to justify additional costs on the basis that the specification was too open ended or incomplete, or do we just take it on the chin?

An thoughts of course gratefully received.

Thanks.

Rob

 

[KM-Tiger]

Do you have a general "this proposal is based on information available to date, we reserve the right to vary prices if further information has a material effect", sort of thing in your T&C's?

 

[rob900]

Thanks for your reply. Unfortunately no is the answer. IT projects of this type aren't our core business. Obviously what we are looking for is a way of proving that there has been a variation to the original specification as a way of justifying the additional costs involved - but as I said, the original spec was so vague that it didnt get the attention it should have. Its worth pointing out that we have just discovered that detailed spec was actually available at the time of tender, but was not issued to us. Had it been, it would have got our attention.

 

[Billmccallum]

If you complete the project to the point where the data is able to be transferred, but the 3rd party system can't read it, is that your problem?

If the specifications were available and not provided to you, does this mean it's the customers responsiblity to ensure connectivity?

I'm no legal expert, but if the terms of the contract were "equipment needs to be able to pass data to some 3rd party hardware", then if the part you build has the capacity to do this, then you have completed the contract to specification.

The client then needs to fund the extra work.

Having said all that you need the help of a solicitor who specialises in contract law.