“Industry Standard” Is a Warning Sign: A Quality Manager’s Lesson in Shipbuilding Specifications

I was standing in the drydock at Harlingen last March, holding a coating thickness gauge that read 315 microns. The spec called for 350. Right next to me, a clipboard from the subcontractor said "within industry tolerance." The yard manager looked at me like I was being pedantic.

He wasn't wrong that the coating was probably fine. But "probably" is not a number. And in this business, numbers are the only thing that saves you from a €200,000 problem.

How I learned to stop trusting “trust us”

When I first started auditing supplier work for our repair projects, I assumed that written requirements were the baseline everyone worked from. I figured if a contract says 350 microns, the vendor reads 350 microns, and they apply 350 microns. That's how I thought the world worked.

Three years later, I can tell you it doesn't.

The reality is that a lot of contractors interpret specifications as aspirational—a starting point for negotiation rather than a fixed target. They deliver what they think is "close enough" and then defend it with language like "standard practice" or "industry norm."

I've rejected more first submissions than I can count on that basis. Not because the quality was dangerous. But because if we let 15% deviations slide on coating, we'd be letting them slide on bilge piping clearance next. Where does it stop?

The Curacao surprise

Here's where the story gets interesting. Around that same time, our sister yard in Curacao had a repeat client with a dredger. The client had requested a specific type of fender installation. The local subcontractor quoted a lower price by using a different material supplier. The client's procurement manager—who was new—accepted the quote because it was 12% cheaper.

Nobody told the client the substitution wasn't equal. The phrase in the quote was "equivalent specification."

Within eight months, two of the fenders showed accelerated wear. Not catastrophic failure. Not a safety incident. Just premature degradation that required replacement—during a charter season, which tripled the cost of the drydocking because of lost hire.

The client's reaction? They didn't blame the subcontractor. They blamed us. Why? Because we issued the repair spec in the first place. We were the ones who allowed an unclear substitution clause to get signed off.

The vendor who lists all fees upfront—even if the total looks higher—usually costs less in the end. That applies to fender material. It applies to paint. It applies to everything.

What I didn't track, and wish I had

I don't have hard data on how many client disputes start from vague specs rather than genuine errors. What I can say anecdotally, from reviewing about 200 project packages a year across our Dutch and Caribbean yards: the disputes are almost never about skilled workmanship. They're about interpretation.

One inspector reads "smooth finish" as fair. Another reads it as mirror-grade. The welder does what he thinks is reasonable. Then the client's surveyor rejects it. Then the contractor and client argue about whether it's rework or an extra. Meanwhile the vessel sits in dock and the schedule slips.

I'll admit part of me used to find this frustrating. I wanted to say, "Why can't you people just read the contract?" Then I realized the problem was on our side.

A €22,000 redo that changed our template

In 2022, I implemented a verification protocol for all repair quotes above €25,000. Every quote has to include a line-by-line breakdown: material grade, manufacturer, thickness, standard, tolerance, and test method.

The first time we enforced this, one supplier withdrew their bid. They said our requirements were "excessive documentation." What they meant was they weren't willing to commit to the exact standard they'd be working to. That alone told me the protocol was right.

But I also ran into pushback from our own sales team. They worried the detail would scare off clients who just wanted a number. So we tested it on a mid-size project: a 75-meter workboat refit in Vlissingen. The client had three quotes on the table. Ours was the most detailed—and about 4% higher than the cheapest bid. They picked us.

When I asked the client's technical superintendent why, he said, "Because you're the only one who told me exactly what I'd be paying for. The other two said 'unspecified hull works.' That could mean anything from a touch-up to a full blast."

That was the moment I stopped seeing transparency as a cost and started seeing it as a filter. It attracts the clients who value certainty, and it screens out the ones who just want to push the risk onto someone else.

Total cost of ownership includes:

• Base repair price
• Specification gaps (which become change orders later)
• Schedule overruns from rework
• Dispute resolution costs
• Client confidence loss

The lowest quoted price is rarely the lowest total cost. I've watched that truth play out at least four times since 2022—and in every case, the "cheap" option ended up costing more after all the change orders settled.

We all know what “normal” is. That’s the problem.

In our Q1 2024 audit, we reviewed 32 delivered projects across our repair divisions. We found that 78% of all extra work billed on those projects traced back to a specification that was ambiguous—something like "repair as necessary" or "in accordance with manufacturer instructions."

Not a single one of those extras was fraudulent. They were all justifiable in isolation. But they shouldn't have been extras. The client had a right to know the full scope before signing.

Here's what I tell our project managers now: if you can't explain a requirement in one sentence with a number in it, you haven't written the requirement yet. "High quality" is not a spec. "Class C surface with <25% rust" is a spec. "Proper fit-up" is not a spec. "Gap tolerance ≤3 mm over 500 mm length" is a spec.

I want to say this without sounding dramatic, but it genuinely changed how I review quote documentation. I read every line as if I have to defend it in front of a surveyor who doesn't trust me. If a line doesn't hold up, it doesn't get into the contract.

Why the answer isn't more paperwork

You might think I'm arguing for longer contracts with more clauses. I'm not. The opposite is true. A tight specification makes a contract shorter, because it removes the need for lawyers to interpret what "reasonable workmanship" means later.

Here's a template I use with our subcontractors—and it's a template I wish clients would use with us:
"This scope defines the required outcome. If something isn't listed, assume it's not in scope. If you believe something is missing, ask before bidding, not after invoicing."

That one paragraph does more work than two pages of legal boilerplate. It forces the conversation to happen before the contract is signed, which is the only time it's free.

The honest trade-off nobody talks about

I have mixed feelings about over-specification. On one hand, I've seen vague specs destroy project budgets. On the other, I've seen clients demand absurd precision on things that genuinely don't matter—like decorative paint finishes in an engine room.

Not everything needs a micron-level tolerance. Good engineering is about matching the requirement to the consequence. A cosmetic defect isn't a safety issue. A coating spec on ballast tanks is.

The mistake isn't choosing a loose spec. The mistake is choosing a loose spec without knowing you chose a loose spec. Make the tolerance explicit, and if the client wants to relax it to save money, that's their call. But it has to be a decision, not an accident.

What I'd tell my younger self

If I could go back to my first year doing quay-side inspections, I'd tell myself one thing: ask "what's not included" before asking "what's the price."

Because the price answer is only meaningful once you know where the boundary is drawn. The contractor who lists all exclusions upfront—even if the total looks higher—usually costs less in the end. The one who smiles and says "don't worry, we'll handle it" is quoting you the door prize and billing you for the buffet later.

At Damen, we now put our specification philosophy in the front of every RFP we issue. Clients can see exactly what we commit to, what we require from them, and where we expect the tolerance bands to be. It's not the most sales-friendly document. But it's the most trust-building one.

And in a market where clients have been burned by vague promises and surprise extras before, trust isn't a soft value. It's the cheapest risk mitigation you'll ever buy.