Stop 3 of 8 · Daily
RFIs
The question that comes back answered the first time: the sheet, the section, the field condition and a proposed resolution the architect can sign.
The RFI that gets answered
Hany writes six or seven RFIs a week. The ones that come back in three days and the ones that come back in three weeks are written differently, and the difference is not politeness.
An answerable RFI has four parts. Where it is, on a real sheet with a real detail. What the documents say, with the spec section. What is actually happening in the field, in two sentences with no argument in them. And a proposed resolution, offered as a proposal, that the architect can approve, amend or reject in one line.
The part Claude helps with is the first two. Pulling the right sheet reference and the right spec paragraph out of a nine hundred page book is the work that makes an engineer put the RFI off until Thursday.
From a field note to a draft
On level six, the supply duct main at grid F4 sits where the reflected ceiling plan shows a continuous light cove. Search the drawings and the spec in this Project and tell me every sheet, detail and spec paragraph that governs this condition: the mechanical plan, the reflected ceiling plan, any section through the corridor, the ceiling height requirement and the clearance requirement if one is stated. Give me sheet numbers and paragraph numbers only, no conclusions yet.
Open the sheets it names. Every one of them. Then write.
Using the RFI template in this Project, draft an RFI on the level six corridor ceiling. References: [the sheets and paragraphs you just confirmed]. Field condition: the duct main at grid F4 is at [elevation], the reflected ceiling plan shows a continuous cove at [elevation], and the two cannot both be built as drawn. Proposed resolution: reroute the duct main above the corridor east of grid F4 with a transition to flat oval, subject to the engineer confirming the pressure drop. Keep the whole thing under two hundred words, neutral, no adjectives about anybody. State the proposal as our proposal for the architect's review, not as a decision.
The log entry and the follow-up
The register entry is the part that gets skipped at 6 pm and costs a week at closeout.
Give me the RFI log line for the draft above: number taken from the next in sequence in the log in this Project, subject in eight words, date raised, discipline, the sheets referenced, ball in court, the response needed by date using the review period in section [01 33 00], and the status. Do not invent a number if the sequence in the log is unclear, tell me instead.
From the RFI log export, list every open RFI where we are past the response date, with the number, the subject, the days over and the last correspondence date. Draft one email to the architect covering all of them as a table, three sentences of cover text, asking for a response date on each. Flag separately any RFI where the answer is now blocking a submittal or a delivery, and say which one.