Selecting a JOC Unit Price Book

Selecting a JOC Unit Price Book, (UPB) is a critical task in assuring access to actionable construction task and cost information and the overall success of any JOC Program.

Four BT, LLC (4BT) develops and fully supports LOCALLY RESEARCHED Unit Price Books (UPB) with appropriate line items for each Owner and each Job Order Contract.

The 4BT JOC UPB is comprised of approximately 60,000-unit price line items/construction tasks which include a description in plain English, labor, material, and equipment details and cost breakdowns, crew information, separate demolition line items, and line item modifiers (additions or subtractions to a parent line item due to quantity, product requirements, work area/location, etc.).  While some UPBs market hundreds of thousands of line items, our experience has shown that most public agency clients use far less than 60,000-line items on a regular basis.  These “oversized” JOC Price Books can contribute to delays, errors, and confusion.

In situations where additional and/or unique construction task line items are required, 4BT researches the items and adds them to the UPB during the start-up phase of the contract and/or as necessary/allowed. This single step minimizes most non-pre-priced (NPP) items without adding unnecessary bulk to the UPB. 4BT UPBs are developed to assure that at least ninety percent (90%) of the dollar value of estimates for work orders is sourced from the UPB.

Line items are organized using CSI MasterFormat and MasterFormat Divisions and levels. Demolition line items are included by section and found at the beginning of each section. 4BT is licensed and authorized by the Construction Specifications Institute (CSI).

A JOC unit price book (UPB) is a required component of a Job Order Contract and provides a standardized method of organizing, describing, and costing numerous repair, renovation, and construction tasks.  A UPB is also a core element of a common data environment (CDE), and integral to LEAN Construction and BIM.

No alt text provided for this image