Can anyone suggest what fee/charge should be considered for releasing autoCAD survey drawings to other architects/designers. A set figure per file or %age based on area. Any thoughts would be helpful.
Making historic archive of survey information available.
Mar 18, 21 1:59 pm ·
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Non Sequitur
probably zero if a client is paying you for the initial service.
Mar 18, 21 2:00 pm ·
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chriscunningham
I was enquiring for releasing drawings to other designers from historic archive.
Mar 18, 21 2:12 pm ·
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Non Sequitur
who's archive? Are you making such files on your own and are attempting to sell them? Are you a property owner/developer looking to sell as-builts to potential designers? Is someone paying you to measure/produce said drawings and if so, what are the terms of that contract? Many questions and doubtful there is much money at the end of any of them.
i do not hand over the cad files to an owner for future use. but if an architect (or sub on a project) calls and asks for a legitimate use project, i'll provide them...plans/elevs, not detailing -- they can use the pdf's for that
i ask for a liability release where the responsibility for cad file accuracy is on the designer using them & I strip out any of my process drafting or personal info (stamps, details that I consider exclusive) that may also be in the file
I used to charge a fee, but now i feel it's just dumb and retaliative. I recently asked an architect for files. He wanted a fee for them plus a liability release saying the fee covered his cost to draft the plans. I couldn't help but think that (1) he'd already been paid for that, and (2) I should just hire him to draft the plans at that fee (it was punitive, but not to the point of actually covering the hours to draft), but he also wanted the liability release too...?!?! Why would I pay you for files that I have to go certify & redraft myself? It just seems to me a fuck you fee and not a legitimate cover of costs to transmit or even for licensed use of design work -- it's a loose as-built...
Ditto. to as build plans and elevations. Maybe a typical wall section if appropriate, but pdf is normally good enough.
Mar 18, 21 2:34 pm ·
·
proto
a pdf that isn't a scanned image (ie printed to pdf direct: vector) can often be converted itself straight to CAD file. I believe a full seat of autocad can do this (I only have LT; someone may have to confirm
)
also, if the file has to be searched & pulled out of deep archive, i don't particularly object to a firm asking to cover costs to get it found, prepped and sent, but I'm guessing it's not more than an hour or two of someone cheap's billable time...
Thanks for those comments, food for thought. The archive is a private planning archive held by the Board of homeowners, who have collected survey information over time for various properties. Maybe a simple administrative charge for searching the archive would be more acceptable?
Mar 18, 21 2:47 pm ·
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Non Sequitur
My local building permit office charges something like $50 to search for docs... with no guarantee that they will find something. Granted they don't offer CAD, but an nominal archive fee attached with a "use-at-your-own-risk" disclaimer is reasonable.
Any half decent designer will do their own site recon anyways so archive files are just a first-step to get things going before the team can head to site.
Many municipalities already have historic GIS data available sufficient for planning purposes. Obviously a more detailed and official survey would be required for any actual development to occur ... but that would be commissioned and paid for by the person developing the property.
Tell me where you live and I'll see if I can find freely available public survey data that might make this whole effort of yours obsolete.
We charge $50/sheet to $250 max for digital drawings, after a digital transfer agreement is signed, to pretty much anyone not an owner... EXCEPT that Principals can waive the fee (they often don't even change the agreement) and I'd say they waive the fee more often than not.
Mar 19, 21 9:24 am ·
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joseffischer
We also charge the same for revit models, but there is a lot of back and forth argument internally that before we send the models out, a list of things need to be scrubbed from them beyond just the "purge" tools. This scrubbing theoretically should be ongoing in a model so you have "clean" models... but never happens, and usually takes a half day- per trade (we have engineers in-house) so arguably we should be charging a lot more for those. Maybe $500 per model?
Mar 19, 21 9:29 am ·
·
mightyaa
Ya... we used to be $250; mostly to cover scrubbing titleblocks etc. We'd also send along some AIA form for transfer of electronic docs as a CYA "use at your own risk" sort of thing.
Mar 19, 21 10:34 am ·
·
Non Sequitur
I've made quite some noise in my office on more than one occasion regarding sharing of revit models. Coordination is fine and the GC can take them "as-is" if they want to coordinate with the subs... but giving it out to others who could use our proprietary families for other projects is a sore spot.
The sore spot I usually had was the “Why didn’t the client rehire us for the project? It isn’t like they don’t know we designed the original..” If I suspected it was cost and the new architect is one of those low bidder types… Good luck getting the drawing files. I’d rather see a low-bidder suffer tight margins than cut them any slack. I’ve had clients come crawling back after experiencing what a cheap set of drawings actually costs… On a couple; they actually brought us back in during construction to sort out the mess.
license fees for use of drawings
Can anyone suggest what fee/charge should be considered for releasing autoCAD survey drawings to other architects/designers. A set figure per file or %age based on area. Any thoughts would be helpful.
um... what's the context here?
Making historic archive of survey information available.
probably zero if a client is paying you for the initial service.
I was enquiring for releasing drawings to other designers from historic archive.
who's archive? Are you making such files on your own and are attempting to sell them? Are you a property owner/developer looking to sell as-builts to potential designers? Is someone paying you to measure/produce said drawings and if so, what are the terms of that contract? Many questions and doubtful there is much money at the end of any of them.
i do not hand over the cad files to an owner for future use. but if an architect (or sub on a project) calls and asks for a legitimate use project, i'll provide them...plans/elevs, not detailing -- they can use the pdf's for that
i ask for a liability release where the responsibility for cad file accuracy is on the designer using them & I strip out any of my process drafting or personal info (stamps, details that I consider exclusive) that may also be in the file
I used to charge a fee, but now i feel it's just dumb and retaliative. I recently asked an architect for files. He wanted a fee for them plus a liability release saying the fee covered his cost to draft the plans. I couldn't help but think that (1) he'd already been paid for that, and (2) I should just hire him to draft the plans at that fee (it was punitive, but not to the point of actually covering the hours to draft), but he also wanted the liability release too...?!?! Why would I pay you for files that I have to go certify & redraft myself? It just seems to me a fuck you fee and not a legitimate cover of costs to transmit or even for licensed use of design work -- it's a loose as-built...
Ditto. to as build plans and elevations. Maybe a typical wall section if appropriate, but pdf is normally good enough.
a pdf that isn't a scanned image (ie printed to pdf direct: vector) can often be converted itself straight to CAD file. I believe a full seat of autocad can do this (I only have LT; someone may have to confirm )
also, if the file has to be searched & pulled out of deep archive, i don't particularly object to a firm asking to cover costs to get it found, prepped and sent, but I'm guessing it's not more than an hour or two of someone cheap's billable time...
Thanks for those comments, food for thought. The archive is a private planning archive held by the Board of homeowners, who have collected survey information over time for various properties. Maybe a simple administrative charge for searching the archive would be more acceptable?
My local building permit office charges something like $50 to search for docs... with no guarantee that they will find something. Granted they don't offer CAD, but an nominal archive fee attached with a "use-at-your-own-risk" disclaimer is reasonable.
Any half decent designer will do their own site recon anyways so archive files are just a first-step to get things going before the team can head to site.
Many municipalities already have historic GIS data available sufficient for planning purposes. Obviously a more detailed and official survey would be required for any actual development to occur ... but that would be commissioned and paid for by the person developing the property.
Tell me where you live and I'll see if I can find freely available public survey data that might make this whole effort of yours obsolete.
We charge $50/sheet to $250 max for digital drawings, after a digital transfer agreement is signed, to pretty much anyone not an owner... EXCEPT that Principals can waive the fee (they often don't even change the agreement) and I'd say they waive the fee more often than not.
We also charge the same for revit models, but there is a lot of back and forth argument internally that before we send the models out, a list of things need to be scrubbed from them beyond just the "purge" tools. This scrubbing theoretically should be ongoing in a model so you have "clean" models... but never happens, and usually takes a half day- per trade (we have engineers in-house) so arguably we should be charging a lot more for those. Maybe $500 per model?
Ya... we used to be $250; mostly to cover scrubbing titleblocks etc. We'd also send along some AIA form for transfer of electronic docs as a CYA "use at your own risk" sort of thing.
I've made quite some noise in my office on more than one occasion regarding sharing of revit models. Coordination is fine and the GC can take them "as-is" if they want to coordinate with the subs... but giving it out to others who could use our proprietary families for other projects is a sore spot.
The sore spot I usually had was the “Why didn’t the client rehire us for the project? It isn’t like they don’t know we designed the original..” If I suspected it was cost and the new architect is one of those low bidder types… Good luck getting the drawing files. I’d rather see a low-bidder suffer tight margins than cut them any slack. I’ve had clients come crawling back after experiencing what a cheap set of drawings actually costs… On a couple; they actually brought us back in during construction to sort out the mess.
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