engineer of record responsibility

huangyhg

engineer of record responsibility
hi everyone!
i have a house addition project under construction. the owner gave me a letter telling " the attic area is covered by plywood without engineer's approval". he plans to use the attic as an extra storage while i haven't design it for that load.
now what should be my response, if he tries to take the resposibility by giving me the letter?
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i am confused! are you the contractor or engineer?
i think you may be talking about liability here rather than responsibility, although they are closely related. if the owner is intending something that you did not approve of, i would make that clearly known. you might also say that it can be done for additional money. reference the code section where it must be designed specifically for more load to accomodate storage.

before you escalate the situation, make sure you have gotten paid then copy the building inspector if need be!
thank you jike for your comment.
by the way, i am the engineer of record. i guess my question more specificly is the following:
" when a homeowner (client) wants to do something which is not per approved plans and he wants to "kind of" take the responsibility or liability, aren't we supposed to stand against it?
the fact is that covering the attic floor by plywood is not against the code and even the inspector can not stop it. it is the future usage of that area which is going to introduce risk to the structure.
some jurisdictions require (for those i am/was building official) a sign be placed near the attic access that the attic cannot be used for storage.  if the trusses/ceiling joists were designed for 20 psf live load, no sign was necessary.  this condition was also placed on the c of o.
sign or no sign, no one can stop a homeowner from storing up there.
you may want to write a clarifying letter to the owner to cover yourself.
   
don phillips
would this not fall under the "protect the public" creed?  i dont care how stupid the owner is.  if the roof caves in while he's got fifty people in the house for a graduation party, you're liable if you knew about it and didn't take it to the authorities.  it's one thing if he does it on his own without you knowing but i think it's completely wrong if you're given documentation and look the other way.
i think you simply write a letter to the homeowner stating clearly that the attic cannot carry more than x amount of load (10 psf?).  beyond that, you can't really go to the city/authority with a speculation that the homeowner may misuse the space by overloading.
all you can do it notify the owner of the house what his physicaly limitations are.
how would you know if the homeowner is really loading the attic beyond x psf?  get a warrant to investigate?
i don't think it's speculation if the owner hands you a letter stating his intent as the op indicated.
the owner may think he's relieving the engineer of liability with the letter, while in reality is actually dragging him into it.
tell them the consequences in writing, then tell them verbally not to get you involved if they decide to proceed with it anyway.
if you get involved then you have to resolve it properly.
also, you may want to tell then to do it after final inspection, so that you do not have to approve the building like that.
if his letter is unclear in the least or implies liability on your part, i would respond back to him in writing.
i agree with jae.  my first instinct was copy the building department with your letter, but you really don't know what's going on.  does the owner know the difference between storage to us (could be 125 psf), and storage for the christmas decorations, baby stuff, spare floor tiles and the like?  maybe you're talking about two different things.  
if the letter stated the guy wanted to store extra cmu block or create another living space, or something that you knew was too heavy, you might have an argument for notifying someone other than the owner, imo.  many people store things in the attic by laying down plywood.  storage to them and storage per the code live load isn't always the same thing.   
live loads for residential per the ibc is:
uninhabitable attics without storage 10 psf
uninhabitable attics with storage 20 psf
not 125 psf