FIDIC glossary · Roles
Employer
Employer
In short
The party commissioning the works and carrying the payment obligations; in the Silver Book it acts through the Employer’s Representative.
What is a Employer?
The Employer is the party that commissions the Works, provides access to the Site and carries the payment obligations. In everyday speech people say "client" or "investor", but in a FIDIC contract this is a strictly defined term with a specific set of duties.
Those duties are consistently underestimated. The Employer must give the right of access to and possession of the Site on time, put financial arrangements in place and evidence them on request, supply site data, and obtain the permits allocated to it. Breaching any of these gives the Contractor a basis for a claim — for time, and often for money.
Sub-Clause 2.4 (Employer's Financial Arrangements) is particularly potent: the Contractor may request evidence that the Employer can pay. A failure to respond is a standalone ground for suspending work.
Under the Red and Yellow Books the Employer acts through the Engineer. Under the Silver Book it acts through the Employer's Representative, which changes the whole dynamic: there is no figure obliged to be neutral when determining.
On MDB projects the Employer's role is usually performed by a project implementation unit at a ministry or agency, not by the borrower itself.
Related terms
Need this read against your own contract?
This explains how the mechanism works in the standard form. How it works in your contract, after the Particular Conditions, is a separate question.
Talk to an expert →A reference explanation of the FIDIC standard conditions. Not legal advice, and not a reproduction of the FIDIC books.