Testing whether a contract supports a claim is a defined exercise rather than a general reading. It has a sequence, each step either passes or it does not, and stopping at the first failure saves everything that would have been spent on the rest. This is the shape of a contractual entitlement review, and it can be applied by your own team as readily as by anybody else.
The discipline is in the order. Most claims are built by starting at step five, valuing the loss, and working backwards to find a justification, which produces detailed documents resting on nothing.
Step one. Define the event precisely
Not the general difficulty but the specific thing that happened, on a date, attributable to somebody. Where a claim cannot pass this step, nothing after it will hold.
Claims framed around prolonged disruption, poor information or general interference usually fail here. They describe a condition rather than an event.
Where there are several events, list them separately. A claim with six events is six claims, and they rarely all have the same answer.
Step two. Find the provision
Identify the clause that covers that event and gives a right to time, money or both. Quote it rather than describing it.
Check the amendments, which is where the provision has most likely been narrowed or qualified, and check the particulars for the figures it relies on.
Where no provision covers the event, stop. The claim is about fairness rather than entitlement, and that is a commercial conversation rather than a contractual one.
Step three. Check the procedure
What the provision required by way of notice, particulars and timing, and whether that was done.
Establish what was actually served, to whom, by what means and when, from documents rather than from recollection.
Where a requirement was a condition and was missed, that is a serious problem and it is better confronted now than later. Where it was a requirement without that consequence, note it and continue.
This step disposes of more claims than any other, which is an argument for taking it third rather than last.
Step four. Test causation on the records
What the contemporaneous records show about the event and its effect. Not what the costs were, but what happened and what it caused.
Be specific about which activities were affected and over what period. General assertions of disruption do not survive this step.
Where the records do not support the causal link, the claim is weak regardless of how strong the entitlement looks on paper.
Step five. Establish the valuation rule
The contract usually says how the entitlement is valued: contract rates, pro rata rates, fair valuation, daywork, or a defined assessment of cost.
The rule frequently produces a different figure from the one a claimant would choose, and applying the wrong rule is a common reason an otherwise sound claim is reduced heavily.
Establishing the rule before valuing anything means the valuation is built on the right basis the first time.
Step six. Value it realistically
Apply the rule to what the records support, and arrive at a figure you would be willing to defend line by line.
Separate what is well supported from what is marginal, because that distinction determines where you can concede in negotiation.
Then set the figure against the cost of pursuing it, which is the commercial decision the whole exercise exists to inform.
What the review produces
A short written position: the event, the provision, the procedural position, what the records show, the valuation rule and a realistic figure.
That document is useful whether the answer is favourable or not. Where it is favourable it becomes the foundation of whatever follows; where it is not, it has saved the cost of finding out the hard way.
It should be short. A review that runs to eighty pages has become a claim document, which is a different exercise with a different purpose.
Where the sequence usually breaks
At step one, where the claim describes a situation rather than an event. At step three, where a notice was missed. And at step four, where the records do not show what the claim asserts.
Those three account for the overwhelming majority of claims that fail, and all three can be tested in days from documents that already exist.
Step two, the absence of a contractual route, is less common than people expect. Most events that genuinely disrupt a project engage some provision; the difficulty is usually procedural rather than substantive.
Applying it to a claim made against you
The same six steps work in reverse. Where a claim arrives, testing it in this order tells you which parts to settle and which to resist.
That is a far stronger position than refusing the whole of it, which invites escalation and costs credibility on the points where you are right.
It also produces a response the other side can engage with, which is frequently what moves a dispute towards settlement rather than towards a formal process nobody wanted to start.
Doing it at the right moment
The best moment is when the event happens, because the records are fresh and the notices can still be served. That is ordinary cost control and variations work rather than claims preparation.
The second best moment is before any position has been stated formally, when the answer can still change what you do without anybody having to retreat.
The worst moment is after a claim has been submitted and refused, which is where most entitlement reviews actually happen. The claims and dispute services are organised so that this sequence runs first, whichever of them is eventually needed.
Not sure whether the contract gives you a route?
A contractual entitlement review tests whether the contract gives a right to additional payment or time for what happened, before anybody argues about what it is worth.