Vendor documents fail projects quietly. By the time the problem is visible on site, the equipment is built, shipped and paid for. These are the five tells we check before anything else.
1. Exceptions buried in the datasheet
The word “by others” in a vendor datasheet is a scope gap with a delivery date. We list every exception and clarification on one register, priced and owned, before the purchase order is signed.
2. Interfaces defined by reference
“Per vendor standard” on a terminal box, flange rating or control signal means the interface has not been engineered — it has been postponed. Every interface should close against a project document, not a catalogue.
3. Performance curves without test conditions
A pump curve or heat-balance figure quoted without the test code and conditions behind it cannot be held at acceptance. If the witness test criteria are not in the package, the guarantee is decorative.
4. Drawings that never change revision
A vendor package that sails through review without a single comment incorporated is not a good package — it is an unread one. Comment-response registers should show closure, not silence.
5. Spares and special tools as an afterthought
Commissioning spares defined “at a later date” reliably arrive after the equipment does. The two-year operating spares list belongs in the technical evaluation, where it still has commercial leverage.
None of these checks require weeks. They require a reviewer whose only client is the owner — which is the point of having one.