As soon as the project is approved, build a table: each project milestone against the instruments in force at that moment. Add a row every time a new decree or circular replaces an old one. The table takes about two days to build and ten minutes to update. Without it, settlement means spending months reconstructing it from the memory of whoever is still there.
One form of price per package. Where a package mixes several kinds of work, split the price annex by part. Most important: the way payment actually happens must match the form of price written down. This is the most expensive lesson here — most of the argument at verification sits precisely on this point.
Acceptance records signed on the day of acceptance. As-built drawings prepared as soon as the item is finished. Site diary written daily. It sounds obvious, and it is the rule most often broken — and the direct cause of most amounts disallowed at settlement.
On a metro, underground work is a very large share of cost and cannot be measured again after completion. Reinforcement before the pour, tunnel support before the lining — each needs photographs carrying time and location, with a record signed by the parties. A photograph without time and location proves almost nothing.
The step most often skipped, and the one that finds the most differences. Do it annually, with a record signed by both sides. A difference found within the year can be dealt with; found after eight years it means tracing the whole chain of vouchers.
Machine tunnelling, signalling installation, overhead power, integrated testing — none of these appears in the general construction norm system. A new norm has to be prepared and approved before the work is done. Do the work first and seek approval later, and that cost will be suspended.
Before trial running starts, obtain approval of a document setting out the scope, the duration, the list of costs and the funding source. Open a separate tracking code in the accounts. It takes a week and saves months at settlement.
Cost directly attributable to an item goes wholly to that item; common cost is allocated in proportion to capital. Build the allocation schedule early and maintain it, rather than sitting down to divide it up at settlement — particularly where assets will go to several different receiving entities.
Do not wait until handover to think about who receives what. Build the table early: item — asset type — expected receiving entity — legal basis for the transfer. It will be revised many times, but having it from the start makes every revision light.
A long, large project will almost certainly face at least one inspection or audit in its life. For each finding: keep the document, track each point in a schedule, record what was done about it and where the evidence sits. At settlement, this schedule is the first thing asked for.
A ten to fifteen year life is longer than the average tenure of a project officer. Every time the responsible officer changes, hand over against a document schedule, not in general terms. The document schedule belongs to the organisation, not to the individual.
Paper vouchers from the early years will fade, go missing, absorb damp. Scan and name them to a convention as they arise — package, document type, date, number. The cost of doing this is trivial beside the cost of hunting for a year-two acceptance record in year eleven.
Settlement of investment capital is work for the whole project management unit: the technical department holds quantities and acceptance records, the contracts department holds the price terms, the planning department holds total investment, the accounts department holds the vouchers. Hand it wholly to accounting and accounting can only consolidate what it is given — and whatever is not given becomes a gap in the file.
A cost arising in 2022 is governed by what was in force in 2022, not by a 2026 instrument. A work item accepted in 2023 takes the norm in force in 2023. This is a basis error, and the verifying authority is entitled to reject it.
The special mechanism shortens a number of steps — but only where the project falls within its scope and within its period of effect. The file must contain the proof: that the project is within the scope of NQ 188/2025, which part of the work arose after the resolution took effect, which step was shortened under which provision. A general reference to “the special mechanism” without citing a provision is not enough.
Not a compliance form. It is the short list of things that, if missing at that moment, cannot be recovered afterwards.
If you would like these turned into procedures and forms for your unit, that is one of the services we provide — see settlement records management from day one.