Site & delivery
cidb grading levels explained, against real adverts
Nine grades, nine ceilings. The grade that earns is the one that matches work actually on the board this week, not the one at the top of the table.
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All resources
Procurement & tenders
Cost & decisions
Steel safeguard duty and what it does to your rate
ITAC added South Korean hot-rolled steel to the safeguard on 4 September 2026 at 11 percent, and the origin of your fabricator's coil now sets part of the rate.
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Cost & decisions
What your spec is worth in a municipal tender
Municipal distributors sell 44% of South Africa's electricity, and a correctly specified protection device only survives their tender if the document says so.
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Compliance
Contractor panel registration, and what to have ready
The application takes an hour. What takes three weeks is chasing documents that could not be issued until something else existed first.
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Cost & decisions
How long retention can be held in South Africa
Retention runs on your contract's clock, not on a statutory one, and on a R3 million job the 5% still held at month nine is R150 000 of yours.
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Compliance
The cidb blacklist and the contract you already signed
The Minister counts 52 contractors off the cidb register against two in its first 22 years, and his number is already behind the gazette. Nobody writes to the client either way.
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Site & delivery
Where to find construction work in a R2 trillion pipeline
Of 263 projects worth R1,99 trillion, the 54 in documentation are the ones that become tenders. The 82 under construction are somebody else's order book.
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Compliance
The restricted suppliers list follows the director
Treasury has recorded 35 companies and 45 directors after Eskom's referrals, and a listed name walks into the next company you register.
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Compliance
Five registers to check before a contractor starts
Four of the five checks that decide whether a contractor may lawfully work on your site are free, and most clients run only one of them.
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The Arabella Brief
What changed this week, and what it costs you on Monday.
One email on a Friday, covering the week from Friday to Thursday so the week is closed when it is written. What actually changed, everything with a date on it, one development run through what it means for a contractor with forty people, and what we got wrong. A thin week is a short issue.