Barriers to life cycle costing usage

Life Cycle Costing (LCC) is widely recognized amongst practitioners and academics as a valuable tool in assessing the economic efficiency of constructed facilities. Clients now want buildings that demonstrate value for money over a long term, and are not interested simply in the design solution which is the least expensive. This change have led to and highlighted the importance of LCC approaches to the design, construction and operation of buildings. However, the majority of building designs are still currently produced unsullied by thoughts of maintenance implications, life expectancy or energy consumption. In a forward looking approach, the paper attempts to provide some recommendations that should facilitate and enhance the implementation of LCC in the UK. A questionnaire was distributed to two group samples of 80 practitioners; the quantity surveyors and builders with a total of 70 practitioners (35 aside) completing the survey. The key findings of the statistical analysis indicated that builders ranked the lack of data as the most prevalent problem while quantity surveyors felt it was the lack of a universal framework. The results suggest that there are different opinions and perplexity on issues relating to LCC application. This research will be of interest to industry practitioners and academic researchers with an interest in life cycle costing