On Site Cost Control System In Construction Company In Viet Nam: A Case Study Of Three Construction Companies In Ho Chi Minh City

Cost control is conceived to ensure that costs stay in line with the planned needs established by the company to achieve economic targets. Every construction firms needs information about costs in order to plan, evaluate, decide, and budget, among other purposes. The cost control is a process that should be continued through the construction period to ensure that the cost of the building is kept within the agreed cost limits. The cost control can divide into two major areas; the control of cost during design stages and the control of cost by the contractors once the construction of project has started. The main objective of cost control is gaining the maximum profit within the designated period and satisfactory quality of work.

Most of Viet Nam Construction Company have cost control system established by themselves; but the systems are system less and ineffective. Mr. Le Hai Son made a case study on “On Site Cost Control System In Construction Company In Viet Nam: A Case Study Of Three Construction Companies In Ho Chi Minh City” to understand the current practice in their organization and explore what factors are effective or deficient that needs improvement.

His study was carried out to study the cost control method in a construction project, to identify the cost control method frequently used by the contractor during the construction stage and to identify the problem faced in controlling the costs on site. The objectives of his study are (1) to study and understand the current on site cost control system in Vietnamese construction companies; (2) to investigate and identify effectiveness and deficiencies cost control system; the factors caused those effects in relation with measurement identification; and (3) to recommend how to improve the cost control system of company base on the attributes founded.

His study revealed that the common trend in Vietnam Construction Company is that cost control procedure has not been systematized. The organizations have initiated a development plan and only a few of them have successfully established their cost control systems. This shortage, therefore, is a major factor that causes contractors' business failures during the current economic recession period. They used the system designed by themselves and applied for all projects they achieved.

Mr. Le Hai son’s study also revealed that site personnel in the organizations have less participation in cost control. According to the companies' policies, the budget is set and solely approved by head office. Normally, head office doesn't let site personnel know budget and assigned them to control only in term of quantity. As a result, site personnel have no cost-conscious mind and are not motivated to monitor and control cost. For cost analyzing and reporting, the responsibility is taken by accountants who can generate information based on bills and invoices. Certainly, the generated cost information can't reflect the real on-site situation and can't provide great benefits to management to take right and timely corrective actions.

In this case study, most of cost codes system used by the contractor or construction management company is not examined to identify their effectiveness in controlling project costs. Therefore, monitoring of actual expenditures of each work item and monitoring of work progress in comparison with budget and actual cost can't be achieved.

His study found some problems that affect to cost control system of company come from following reasons:

1. Human factors and type of training cost engineers –Viet Nam does not have professional estimators, hence construction management on cost control had not yet assessed appropriately. Training mission to provide engineers and expert in this field had not yet considered important.

2. Estimate norm - Viet Nam has many norm systems, but they are deficient, inadequate and complicated. Many construction works in norm are not appropriate with reality leading cost management, setting up estimate, verifying, approving and executing have difficulties during last period.

3. Material calculation method - it is necessary to have a regulation that stipulate adequate real cost, it can be considered that we can follow the announcement from prestige supplier; therefore we can compare and chose.

4. Labor cost calculation- each province has different comprehension and calculation method about labor cost and caused difficulty in establishing and managing the cost.

5. Treat inflation for construction buildings- the internal and international market price have powerful fluctuation.

6. Reserve expenditures for building construction -With the regulation for reserve cost about fifteen percentages “for feasibility study” for both inflation and quantity are not appropriate. Modification of the project, additional cost and efficiency investment can not avoid and the difficulties with investment project from capital sources will increase.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.

Abstract
In a recent consulting assignment we realized that there was some lack of understanding of the whole system of project cost control, how it is setup and applied. Consulting engineering companies need an adequate cost control system to improve their profitability and productivity. It is important to keep current on a project's cost by maintaining a reliable cost control system. Most of Viet Nam construction companies do not have an appropriate cost control system that can maintaining a reliable cost control system ;enables a contractor to analyze the productivity of workers, the performance and efficiency of equipment, the cost of materials, and the proper allocation of overhead expenses. The goal of this study is surveying current practice about cost control system in Viet Nam construction company and suggestion factors for improving the system. The study was implemented with case study from three different scale companies. For assessing effectiveness and deficiencies, the system from three companies were evaluated by comparing with measure identification propose by Eknarin Sripraset (2000). The survey indicated that most of systems are self design ; in addition there is no integration between code accounting and cost code. These two main factors contribute to the deficiencies of the system and make the company loss severe benefit.