by Jbs041109e3 — April 20, 2009—The Construction Specifications Institute (CSI) has announced that it is introducing a new annual revision process for maintaining and updating MasterFormat. A product of CSI and Construction Specifications Canada (CSC), MasterFormat is used to organize construction documents for commercial and institutional building projects in the United States and Canada.
According to CSI, using a defined periodic updating process will provide a number of benefits to MasterFormat and its users:
- Greater predictability for numbers and titles by providing a limited, grouped set of revisions released at a predictable time each year;
- More certainty about when submitted proposals will be resolved; and
- Improved capacity to keep pace with the volume of submitted proposals.
Proposals already received to revise MasterFormat and those submitted by April 30, 2009 will be eligible for consideration during the 2009 revision cycle. Proposals submitted after April 30, 2009, will be considered for the 2010 revision cycle.
The MasterFormat revision process will continue to be conducted by the MasterFormat Maintenance Task Team (MFMTT), a committee of volunteers appointed by CSI, CSC, and MasterFormat Sponsors. The MFMTT’s annual revision review workshop will take place in late July and results from that meeting will be announced in September.
MasterFormat is designed to aid project delivery by facilitating communication among architects, engineers, specifiers, contractors, suppliers, and other consultants, which helps them meet building owners’ requirements, timelines, and budgets. By fostering fuller and more detailed construction specifications, MasterFormat can reduce costly changes or delays in projects due to incomplete, misplaced, or missing information.
