Prospective method
Time impact analysis
Update the programme to the moment before the event, insert the event, and measure the forecast effect.
- Jurisdiction
- General method guidance, not jurisdiction specific
- Law and editions as at
- 3 August 2026
- Last reviewed
- 3 August 2026
- Editorial status
- Editorial draft, not yet independently reviewed
The question it answers
What was this event likely to do to completion, judged when it happened?
Contemporaneous assessment of an extension of time, and any contract that asks for the effect of an event to be assessed at the time rather than argued at the end.
Minimum evidence
- A reliable accepted programme
- Progress updated to the status date immediately before the event
- A fragnet, or a defensible model, of the event itself
- Evidence of what the team knew at the status date
Time impact analysis is the method with the strongest internal logic among the prospective family, because it tests the event against the project as it actually stood rather than against the original plan. That strength is also its cost: it needs a programme that was genuinely being updated while the job ran, and on many projects that is precisely what does not exist.
Where several events are modelled, the order of insertion matters and must be explained. Inserting events in a different sequence can produce different answers, and an analysis that does not say why it chose its order has left its most contestable decision undefended.
Strengths
- Models the likely future effect using the information the decision-maker actually had
- Aligns with contract machinery that assesses events as they arise
- Keeps hindsight out of a decision that was made without it
Frequent failures
- Hindsight smuggled in through the fragnet or the updated logic
- A status date chosen to flatter the result
- Weak or open-ended logic that lets the inserted event drive nothing, or everything
Mandatory caution
The forecast effect is not the actual outcome, and the two can differ honestly. Where the contract prescribes a procedure, that procedure is part of the analytical question.
Other methods
Where the record comes in
Every mechanism on this page turns on evidence: what happened, what was known and when. A record built as the job happens is worth more than any argument assembled afterwards. Construction Metric keeps that record automatically, from the messages, photographs and voice notes a site team already sends.
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The analysis on this site is only as fast as the evidence behind it. AI Metric builds bespoke systems for consultancies, contractors and claims teams: document and correspondence triage, event registers assembled from the project record, programme and cost reconciliation, and drafting support that always cites the document it came from. Built for review by your own experts, never to replace their judgement.
Do not overread this page
No method decides entitlement, and no method is court approved. A method is fit when it answers the relevant question with the reliable data available, respects the contract and the governing law, and survives alternative explanations. The choice must be explained and defended, not asserted.
General explanation of how contract mechanisms, analysis methods and legal principles generally work. It is not legal or contractual advice, not an opinion on any project, and no standard-form contract wording is reproduced anywhere on this site. Standard forms are routinely amended, so every default described here, including every time period, can be different on your project. Your executed contract, as amended, and the governing law and forum always control. Deadlines may already be running: if an event has occurred, preserve your position and take qualified advice.