The new suite of contracts will replace the NEC3 contracts and will be calledNEC4. They will be made available to purchase from 22 June 2017 following the NEC annual users' group seminar.
It is understood that there are to be some cosmetic changes in the terminology used, for example the 'Employer' will now be known as the 'Client' in most forms of NEC4 contract and there will be changes to the names of the various sections and schedules. Changes will also be introduced with the intention of allowing the parties to work collaboratively using advances in technology and digital communication, and the Early Contractor Involvement clauses published by NEC back in 2015 will now be incorporated into the NEC4 contracts.
Although the NEC contracts do not contain any express reference to legislation, the NEC4 will provide the opportunity to update the contracts in line with, for example, the Bribery Act 2010.
The NEC3 have been used on a wide variety of high profile projects since they were released in 2005, including the London Olympics and the Crossrail project. However, the NEC now consider that the time is right for the experience gained over the last 12 years to be put into practice in the new suite of documents.
This does not mean that the NEC3 contract cannot be used and any project where you are planning on using an NEC3 contract can still proceed using that form of contract. Where you have a framework or template contract set up based around an NEC3 contract, this does not need to be changed or updated. Over time, however, the NEC4 contract will be used increasingly regularly and become the norm, and the NEC3 contract will effectively be phased out.