What Is Quantity Surveying?
Quantity surveying is the engineering-commercial discipline that manages a project’s quantities, costs and contracts from feasibility through to the final account.
Definition
The quantity surveyor (QS) owns the quantitative, financial and contractual side of a project: preparing and checking bills of quantities, estimating costs, analysing tenders, managing progress claims, variation orders and claims, and closing out the final account.
The role across the project stages
Before award: estimates, bills of quantities, tender documents and offer analysis. During execution: monthly progress claims, valuation of changes, cost control. At close-out: the final account, settlement of claims and release of retention.
Modern tooling
QS work has moved from manual spreadsheets to platforms that join take-off to pricing to progress claims. What used to take a week of sorting and pricing is done by a specialised platform such as Etimadco in a single sitting, with a complete audit trail.
Worked example
On a residential building, the QS checks the concrete quantities before submission and finds 120 m³ missing from the slabs item. Correcting the tender saves the contractor roughly SAR 150,000 that would otherwise have surfaced during execution.
FAQ
What is the difference between a quantity surveyor and a cost engineer?
They overlap heavily. By convention the QS leans to the contractual side (claims, variations, disputes) and the cost engineer to estimating, control and analysis — in the Saudi market the two titles are used interchangeably.
Is the discipline in demand in the Saudi market?
It is among the most sought-after as project volumes grow, and professional credentials such as RICS and SCE raise a practitioner’s market value.
Put this to work with Quantity Surveying
The quantity surveyor’s toolkit: takeoff and pricing to interim payments and variations
Explore Quantity Surveying