Causes of delay and cost overrun for educational building projects in Egypt

Abstract EN

The construction industry is considered one of the most important industries in Egypt.

the majority of construction projects are known to have time delays and cost overruns.

the main contribution of this study is that it is the first study of its type that identifies causes of delay and cost overrun in educational building projects with its different types (public schools, private schools, public universities, and private universities) within Egypt.

the research main objective is to identify the causes of delay and cost overrun in educational building projects in Egypt and evaluate their importance by the main project stakeholders (consultants, contractors, and owners).

this objective was accomplished by means of an extensive literature review and a questionnaire-based survey.

forty causes of delay and cost overrun were gathered through the literature review and categorized into seven groups.

the questionnaire was divided into three sections; the main section concentrated on the causes of delay and cost overrun in construction projects.

responses were gathered from 130 participants representing the key stakeholders participated in the project's construction.

the analysis was conducted to determine the amount of delay and cost overrun experienced by the projects, in addition to the indices concerning the frequency of occurrence, impact on time and cost, and significance of the seven groups.

as well, a ranking of the forty causes was performed to identify the most critical causes of delay and cost overrun in each type of educational building projects (public schools, private schools, public universities, and private universities).

concluded that the most common causes of delay and cost overrun between all types are: price instability, price escalation of material, delays in contractor’s progress payment, financial problems, and contractor’s difficulties in financing the project.