Scope guide

Inclusions and exclusions: the lines that stop the arguments

Most quote disputes are not about the price. They are about what the client thought was in it. Inclusions and exclusions are the cheapest insurance in the document: a dozen lines that decide whether a later phone call is a two-minute clarification or a stand-off over who pays. Here is how to write both sides, and the exclusions builders leave off.

For AU residential and renovation work8 minute read

Why you list both sides

A quote with only inclusions leaves every gap to the client's imagination, and they will imagine the gap in their favour. A quote with only exclusions reads as defensive. List both. Inclusions tell the client what they are getting; exclusions draw the edge of the job so there is no argument about where it stops. The pair is what turns "I assumed that was included" into "it is on the exclusions list".

A scope page, marked up

This is the inclusions and exclusions block from a kitchen renovation quote, with the allowances carved out below. Illustrative, not a real job.

The exclusions builders forget

These are the ones that come back as a variation, or worse, an argument. None of them are exotic. They are the items everyone assumes are obvious until the client does not.

• Asbestos if foundIn any pre-2000 building. Discovery stops work and triggers licensed removal; never absorb it silently.
• Structural changesRemoving or altering a load-bearing wall pulls in an engineer and approvals you did not price.
• Pre-existing damage and rectificationRot, termite damage, an out-of-true slab. You did not cause it and the quote should say so.
• Approvals, permits and authority feesCouncil, certifier, body corporate. State who lodges and who pays.
• Anything "while you're there"The extra power point, the patched ceiling next door. Small jobs that are nobody's line until they are everybody's.

Keep allowances out of the inclusions list

A PC item or a provisional sum is not an inclusion in the flat sense, because the figure will move. If you bury a $900 tapware allowance inside "supply and install tapware" and the client picks a $1,600 mixer, the difference reads as a price hike rather than a choice they made. Show each allowance as its own line with the word "allowance" and that it adjusts to actual cost. The difference, up or down, then lands on a progress claim that the client already understood.

Wording that holds up

• Write exclusions as specifics, not "anything not listed above". A catch-all exclusion is the line a client and an adjudicator both read against you.
• Do not copy a generic inclusions list between jobs. Inclusions travel; exclusions are job-specific. Review them every time, on site if you can.
• Match the words to your contract. If you quote "make good" and the contract says "rectify and paint", pick one and use it in both.
• Where an exclusion could become work, name the path: "asbestos removal, if found, by a licensed remover at an additional cost, quoted before work resumes".