We are a small drafting/design services company that has been in business for over 25 yrs. We have recently become involved with a couple of clients that have us pull plans and specs from construction data websites such as Reed. My question is this: How does a firm like ours become a plan holder? Is it licensing? Who you know? Would we have to have a P.E. on staff?
awaiting_deletion
Jan 23, 15 6:50 pm
What is plan holder?
BulgarBlogger
Jan 23, 15 6:51 pm
ugh- you probably reproduce the garbage that's cluttering the god awful suburban towns... go to some engineering forum where good design is of no interest.
mikehaff
Feb 3, 15 9:13 am
Excuse me BulgarBlogger. I don't know what "garbage" to which you are referring. We have been in business for almost thirty years and have earned a lot of respect over time. I'm not sure what the purpose is in throwing insults around. I'm always looking for ways to expand our business. Seriously, why did you bother commenting if you have nothing to offer other than arrogance?
curtkram
Feb 3, 15 9:58 am
i would like to reiterate olaf's question
what is a plan holder?
being in business for 25 or 30 years is certainly impressive, but is that really a good metric for what you're trying to tell us here? bulgar isn't insulting your years of experience.
mikehaff
Feb 3, 15 10:13 am
To answer your question, plan holders are contractors that are authorized to distribute hard copies of project plans and specifications. They are the only ones that are known to have the absolute latest revision documents.
Saint in the City
Feb 3, 15 10:21 am
Mikehaff -- what is your purpose when you "pull plans and specs from construction data websites such as Reed.".....? What are you then doing with the plans that you "pull"?
In my experience, this is typically a Bidding/Negotiation phase term: A Plan Holder is typically nothing more than a person or entity holding a set of plans for a project -- i.e., like a contractor or a plan room service (like Reed) who has put down the required deposit to receive temporary use of a set of Bid Docs. A Plan Holder's List shows everyone who has a set plans and might bid on the job.
Saint in the City
Feb 3, 15 10:23 am
kind of cross posted, Mikehaff, but I did get a question in there...
Saint in the City
Feb 3, 15 10:29 am
To answer your question, plan holders are contractors that are authorized to distribute hard copies of project plans and specifications. They are the only ones that are known to have the absolute latest revision documents.
Now that I'm not familiar with... in my experience, usually the architect or a copy center will distribute. Service like iSquare Foot, etc., will scan and post the docs for viewing/printing, but they can't charge for them, and have no "authorization", so you kind of take your chances with them.
What am I missing?
curtkram
Feb 3, 15 10:47 am
we have a copy shop that will do that. the copy shop's business is of course making copies of drawings, so for them to do it is kind of a synergy. if a casework sub-contractor wants to bid, they can have the copy shop print a set and send it to them. for my office, we very rarely use that service.
our office also has an ftp site, which is sometimes used in a similar fashion if that's what ends up the most convenient for everyone. holding files on an ftp server isn't something we charge for, as far as i know, so it's not a profit center type thing.
having a drafting shop hold files like that wouldn't bring any value that i can see. having a contractor do that would be a conflict of interest. i'm not sure what you do, but then i'm not really sure what you think you're going to do as a plan holder either. it seems that service is typically supplemental and provided to help them maintain whatever their primary service is if that makes sense.
Saint in the City
Feb 3, 15 10:52 am
^ Matches what I described. As far as what MikeHaff is looking to do -- I can't say....his question: Would we have to have a P.E. on staff? ... What the heck? No idea where all that is going.
mikehaff
Feb 3, 15 11:26 am
In a nutshell. I thought that maybe there was a certification or something. In which case, it would be a business opportunity to be an authorized plan holder. As an example, when I go to Insight(Reed), it has a list of plan holders, that are often actually contractors. It's never a Kinkos or repro firm. Thank you all for your input. It appears that this was one of those things that went nowhere. Back to the business at hand.
curtkram
Feb 3, 15 11:34 am
as i understand it, reed and dodge reports generate leads for contractors. i think their business model is more along the lines of telemarketing/cold-calling.
We are a small drafting/design services company that has been in business for over 25 yrs. We have recently become involved with a couple of clients that have us pull plans and specs from construction data websites such as Reed. My question is this: How does a firm like ours become a plan holder? Is it licensing? Who you know? Would we have to have a P.E. on staff?
What is plan holder?
ugh- you probably reproduce the garbage that's cluttering the god awful suburban towns... go to some engineering forum where good design is of no interest.
Excuse me BulgarBlogger. I don't know what "garbage" to which you are referring. We have been in business for almost thirty years and have earned a lot of respect over time. I'm not sure what the purpose is in throwing insults around. I'm always looking for ways to expand our business. Seriously, why did you bother commenting if you have nothing to offer other than arrogance?
i would like to reiterate olaf's question
what is a plan holder?
being in business for 25 or 30 years is certainly impressive, but is that really a good metric for what you're trying to tell us here? bulgar isn't insulting your years of experience.
To answer your question, plan holders are contractors that are authorized to distribute hard copies of project plans and specifications. They are the only ones that are known to have the absolute latest revision documents.
Mikehaff -- what is your purpose when you "pull plans and specs from construction data websites such as Reed.".....? What are you then doing with the plans that you "pull"?
In my experience, this is typically a Bidding/Negotiation phase term: A Plan Holder is typically nothing more than a person or entity holding a set of plans for a project -- i.e., like a contractor or a plan room service (like Reed) who has put down the required deposit to receive temporary use of a set of Bid Docs. A Plan Holder's List shows everyone who has a set plans and might bid on the job.
kind of cross posted, Mikehaff, but I did get a question in there...
To answer your question, plan holders are contractors that are authorized to distribute hard copies of project plans and specifications. They are the only ones that are known to have the absolute latest revision documents.
Now that I'm not familiar with... in my experience, usually the architect or a copy center will distribute. Service like iSquare Foot, etc., will scan and post the docs for viewing/printing, but they can't charge for them, and have no "authorization", so you kind of take your chances with them.
What am I missing?
we have a copy shop that will do that. the copy shop's business is of course making copies of drawings, so for them to do it is kind of a synergy. if a casework sub-contractor wants to bid, they can have the copy shop print a set and send it to them. for my office, we very rarely use that service.
our office also has an ftp site, which is sometimes used in a similar fashion if that's what ends up the most convenient for everyone. holding files on an ftp server isn't something we charge for, as far as i know, so it's not a profit center type thing.
having a drafting shop hold files like that wouldn't bring any value that i can see. having a contractor do that would be a conflict of interest. i'm not sure what you do, but then i'm not really sure what you think you're going to do as a plan holder either. it seems that service is typically supplemental and provided to help them maintain whatever their primary service is if that makes sense.
^ Matches what I described. As far as what MikeHaff is looking to do -- I can't say....his question: Would we have to have a P.E. on staff? ... What the heck? No idea where all that is going.
In a nutshell. I thought that maybe there was a certification or something. In which case, it would be a business opportunity to be an authorized plan holder. As an example, when I go to Insight(Reed), it has a list of plan holders, that are often actually contractors. It's never a Kinkos or repro firm. Thank you all for your input. It appears that this was one of those things that went nowhere. Back to the business at hand.
as i understand it, reed and dodge reports generate leads for contractors. i think their business model is more along the lines of telemarketing/cold-calling.
Draftsmen....
- lol....