What an FRP package is, and why head contractors let the structure that way
FRP is the industry's shorthand for the three trades that build a concrete frame: formwork, reinforcement (steel fixing) and placement (concreting). Letting them as one package is how most Sydney head contractors buy a structure.
The three letters
Formwork forms the elements: slabs, walls, columns, cores and stairs. Reinforcement is the steel placed and tied inside the form to the engineer's schedule. Placement is the pour: concrete placed, compacted, screeded, finished and cured. Scaffolding is not in the acronym, but on a multi-storey building it rises with the structure and is often let with it.
Why it is let as one contract
The three trades hand over to each other every cycle. The deck is propped, then the steel is tied, then the engineer inspects, then the pour goes down, then the deck is stripped and the next level starts. Split across three companies, every one of those handovers is a place the program can slip. Under one contract the sequence is one company's responsibility and the head contractor runs one program line for the structure.
How an FRP package is priced
Each trade keeps its own basis. Formwork per square metre of contact area by element, or a lump sum with the measure behind it. Reinforcement per tonne, with post-tensioned slabs on their own rate, mesh per sheet, and day labour for footings. Placement per square metre for slabs and per cubic metre or per pour for footings and vertical elements. A good quotation shows all three so any trade can be awarded alone.
What is normally excluded
Concrete supply and pump, crane time, survey and council permits usually sit with the head contractor and are listed as exclusions. Where the builder wants supply or pump included, the quotation says so and prices it.
What to ask an FRP contractor
Whether the three trades are self-performed or subcontracted on, who supervises the sequence on site, how inspections are called, what the monthly claim includes, and what the certificates of currency and the subcontractor's statement look like. The answers tell you whether the package is real or a label.
Questions
Is FRP the same as a structural package?
In practice yes. Structural package usually adds scaffolding to the three FRP trades.
Can the trades be awarded separately?
Yes, if the quotation is itemised. The program advantage only exists when at least the formwork, steel and pour are one company.
Does MK Management Group self-perform all three?
Yes, with its own crews, plus scaffolding. The 86-apartment building in Blacktown is running as one FRP package now.
Send the drawings.
Issue the for-construction set for the packages you want priced and the quotation comes back itemised, with the basis shown against every line.