Subconsultant Agreements
Subconsultant Agreements That Flow Through
Back-to-back agreements for architects and lead consultants across Australia, so obligations pass cleanly through your consultant team
When you take on a full design service and engage others to deliver part of it, you are responsible to the client for the whole. Your subconsultant agreements are what let you meet that responsibility without carrying everyone else's risk.
Christopher Larcos advises architects and lead consultants on the agreements they use with the consultants they engage. Having run architectural projects and coordinated consultant teams himself, he knows where the disciplines meet, where responsibility blurs, and where a gap between the head agreement and the subconsultant terms turns into a claim you cannot pass on.
Whether you are formalising an informal arrangement or standardising a set of appointments as your practice grows, the aim is the same: terms that line up from the client down to each consultant.
What advice on subconsultant agreements covers
Back-to-back obligations
Passing the relevant head-agreement obligations through to each subconsultant, so what you owe the client is matched by what your consultants owe you.
Scope and coordination
Defining each consultant's scope and the coordination between disciplines, so responsibility is clear and nothing falls between the appointments.
Liability and insurance flow-down
Aligning standard of care, liability limits and professional indemnity requirements from the client down to each consultant, so recovery is possible when it is needed.
Payment and novation
Fee stages, invoicing and the right to be paid, plus provisions so the consultant team can be novated together on a design and construct project.
Common questions
What is a subconsultant agreement?
When an architect or lead consultant is engaged for a full design service but subcontracts part of it, structural, services, landscape, or specialist consultants, a subconsultant agreement is the contract between the lead consultant and each of those consultants. It sets the scope each is responsible for, how they coordinate, how they are paid, and how liability is shared, sitting beneath the head Client Architect Agreement.
Why do my subconsultant agreements need to be back-to-back?
If your agreement with the client commits you to obligations your subconsultants have not accepted, you carry the gap. Back-to-back terms pass the relevant head-contract obligations, on scope, program, standard of care, insurance and confidentiality, through to each subconsultant, so what you owe the client is matched by what they owe you. Where the terms do not line up, a claim from the client can land on you with no way to pass it on.
Who is liable if a subconsultant's work is defective?
Under a typical head agreement the lead consultant is responsible to the client for the whole service, including the parts performed by subconsultants. That is why the flow-down of standard of care, liability limits and professional indemnity insurance matters: it lets you recover from the responsible subconsultant rather than absorbing the loss. The agreements should be drafted so the liability position is consistent from the client down to each consultant.
Should subconsultant appointments deal with novation?
On design and construct projects, yes. If the lead consultant's appointment is to be novated to the builder, the subconsultant agreements should anticipate that, so the whole consultant team transfers together on consistent terms. Leaving novation out of the subconsultant agreements is a common cause of gaps that only appear once the appointment has moved.
Keep reading
Client Architect Agreements
The head agreement between you and your client, which your subconsultant terms need to sit beneath.
ContinueLawyer for Architects
Legal advice across the life of an architectural practice, from a solicitor who is also an architect.
ContinueNovation
How an appointment, and the consultant team beneath it, transfers to the builder on design and construct projects.
ContinueCredentials
- Dual-qualified solicitor and registered architect
- Fellow of the Australian Institute of Architects (FRAIA)
- 40+ years in the construction industry
- Advises architects, consultants and practices