Contractors are responsible for reviewing all bid and contract documents as they relate to their work. What can be seen, or reasonably inferred, gets priced. The contractor is responsible for the disclosure of patent errors and the contractor is normally required to conduct a prebid site inspection.
While it is certainly desirable to be able to discover mistakes, inconsistencies, or other problems with the contract in time to minimize their effects on the project, it is not the contractor’s responsibility to do so. The contractor is not required to perform a complete search of documents seeking out hidden flaws in the contract, making subsurface explorations, or undertaking any other extreme investigations. That should have been done by the owner and/or the design professionals prior to the bid.
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