Alan Phillips, a self-employed architect based in Hove, East Sussex, faced allegations against him from two separate clients during a misconduct committee held across 14 days in December and February. The architect attended all of his hearing dates.

The ARB’s professional conduct committee heard how in 2014 a local business director employed Phillips to develop designs for land he had purchased.

The project began on site with a contractor employed by Phillips but substructure works overran by months, racking up bills that the client felt ‘financially committed to carrying on with’. The total cost amounted to £423,202, the ARB heard. 

The architect and the client ended up in a lengthy legal dispute, which found in favour of the client, assessing that he had overpaid by £197,000 on the project.

During the litigation, Phillips argued he had not been the contract administrator on the project.

An independent inquirer for the ARB acknowledged that, though he ‘thought [Phillips] was confused about his role’ as contract administrator, he had taken on the role’s obligations.

As such, the inquirer said, the architect had failed to perform his duties as contract administrator and had advised the client to use a contract type that was ‘ill-suited to the development’. 

During cross-examination, Phillips maintained that he had selected the correct contract. He disagreed that he was partly responsible for failings on the project or that he had failed in his duties as contract administrator. 

But the ARB found Phillips guilty of having ‘failed to carry out his duties as contract administrator appropriately’, following ‘the belated realisation that he had taken on the obligations of contract administrator only after the event’.

It concluded his ‘lack of formality’ in setting out terms of engagement was ‘a significant factor in the resulting disputes and confusion associated with the project’. 

The professional conduct committee also heard how a second client had hired Phillips in 2018 to design her a ‘dream retirement home’ on a plot of land in Brighton and Hove with tricky topography, providing a strict budget of £300,000.

Phillips drew up the plans, submitted them to the council and received planning permission.

However, before planning permission was granted the client decided she no longer wanted to work with Phillips, citing concerns such as the design on uneven topography and his failure to respond to her requests for cost advice on the groundwork. She then employed a new architect.

The new practice drew up a 3D model based on Phillips’ drawings, and assessed that his design  would not work on the topography of the site, advising the client they would need to start from scratch.

The ARB’s inquirer ‘considered that [Phillips’] proposal was probably unachievable’.

The client described the experience as a ‘nightmare’ and tried to get a refund from Phillips on the cost of the plans and planning application but he refuted her claim. 

The ARB described Phillips’ failure to address the client’s concerns about the cost of the groundwork on the project as a ‘significant’ factor in her decision to ‘lose faith’ in Phillips and seek a new architect. 

The committee concluded his failure constituted non-compliance with the RIBA Stage 3 requirement to provide his client with a ‘better understanding of the design and cost implication’ of the project. 

Overall, the committee concluded that Phillips’ conduct across both projects amounted to a breach of the code on a number of counts and, in particular, ‘fell significantly short’ of Standard 4.4 regarding provision of adequate terms of engagement, outlining his ‘casual and ill-informed approach to contract formation’.

It added: ‘[Phillips] conceded that he had been distracted at the relevant time by the various media roles and associated events that his career had attracted and he now acknowledges the need to refocus on the basic elements of his practice.’ 

The ARB noted that the architect ‘regretted his shortcomings’ and maintained that it was not too late for him to learn from the experience during the hearing.

It noted his ‘otherwise long, exemplary and unblemished career’, spanning 46 years ‘without incident’.

The ARB has issued a penalty order of £2,500, which Phillips agreed to pay within 28 days of the hearing conclusion.

The AJ spoke to Phillips, who said he was not yet ready to comment on the outcome of the hearing, or on whether he planned to appeal the decision.