Adjudication
Adjudication is the fast statutory process under security of payment legislation for resolving payment disputes - a decision on the documents, typically within weeks, binding until final proceedings, and enforceable as a debt.
It is not court: no lawyers required, no hearings in the usual sense, and determinations typically land within ten business days of the adjudicator accepting. It was built for one thing - cash flow - and it is won on paperwork assembled months before the dispute existed: notices, site records, dockets, emails that anchor dates.
Why it matters to subbies
Most subbies never need to file, because a builder who knows you can - and that your records support it - pays differently. Knowing your position under your state's Act is leverage before it is ever a filing.
Keep reading
General information for Australian subcontractors, not legal advice - contract drafting and state legislation vary and change; your document and your state's Act govern. Written by Mat Kennedy at The Construction Contracts Co.