Claims Against a Vendor or Contractor

Who Brings the Claim

The party that contracted is the party that sues. If the agreement was between the vendor and the cooperative corporation or the board of managers — which is how it should be — the building is the plaintiff, and the agent's role is providing the evidence.

Where the managing agent signed in its own name rather than as agent for a disclosed principal, the picture is messier: the agent may be the contracting party, which cuts both ways. It may give you standing to sue, and it also means the vendor can come after you for payment. This is the reason the signature block matters, and why it should always read as agent for the named building.

What These Claims Look Like

• Defective work

  Work that fails, leaks, or does not meet the specification. The measure of damages is generally the cost to correct it, which means getting a competing contractor's assessment and estimate early — before the defective work is torn out and the evidence disappears.

• Abandonment

  A contractor who stops mid-project, usually with a substantial part of the contract price already paid. The claim is the cost to complete above the remaining contract balance, plus the consequences of the delay. Scaffolding left standing for a year on a facade job generates costs of its own.

• Overbilling and unperformed work

  Charges for labor or materials that cannot be substantiated, inflated change orders, or a service contract billed monthly for visits that never happened. These require a document-by-document reconciliation, and they frequently surface only when a new managing agent reviews the file.

• Warranty claims

  Work that fails within its warranty period where the contractor will not honor it. Check the warranty terms and any notice requirements before the period runs — warranties are routinely forfeited by buildings that complained verbally and never wrote.

• Damage caused by the vendor

  A contractor who floods units, damages the roof, or injures someone. Beyond the direct claim, the contract's indemnification provision and the building's status as an additional insured on the vendor's policy are usually the faster route to recovery.

When There Is a Mechanic's Lien

Most contractor disputes surface as a lien. A vendor who is not paid — often because the building withheld payment over defective work — files a mechanic's lien against the building, and the dispute becomes two matters at once.

The lien has its own deadlines and its own procedures for discharge, bonding and foreclosure, and they do not wait for the underlying quality dispute to be resolved. A lien on the building also interferes with refinancing and with unit closings, which turns a contained construction dispute into an urgent problem for every shareholder trying to sell. See mechanic's lien deadlines, discharge and foreclosure.

What to Preserve

• The contract, all change orders, and the proposal and scope documents it incorporated
• Payment records and the payment application history
• Photographs and video of the work as it progressed, and of the defective condition
• Every written complaint made to the vendor, with dates — verbal complaints are worth very little later
• Inspection reports, engineer's or architect's assessments, and punch lists
• The vendor's certificates of insurance and any bonds
• Correspondence about delays, and records of what the delay cost the building
• A replacement contractor's estimate for the cost to correct or complete

Speak With Our Firm

• Move before the evidence is gone

  Vendor claims weaken quickly. Defective work gets torn out by the replacement contractor, the corporation that did the job dissolves, and warranty and lien deadlines pass. The right time to call is when the job is visibly going wrong and payment is still being withheld — the building's leverage is never greater than when it still holds money.

  Call 212-233-1233 or email [email protected]. See also defending a claim brought by a vendor.