commercial
Commercial plastering and dry lining
Commercial plastering and dry lining is tendered per contract rather than priced per square metre. What the price turns on is programme, specified finish level, and whether the partitions need certified fire or acoustic performance.
What this covers
What it costs. Commercial plastering is tendered per contract. Full cost breakdown.
What the job covers
- Metal stud partitioning across an office or retail fit-out
- Suspended ceiling grid and board to a specification
- Fire rated and acoustic partitions certified to a standard
- Large-area skimming on a programme with other trades
- Working to a main contractor's programme and sign-off
What is involved
Commercial work is the same materials on a different footing. Metal stud partitions rather than timber, suspended ceiling grids, boarding specified by performance rather than by habit, and finishes called out by level on a drawing. The plasterer is one trade on a programme with fifteen others, and the ability to have twelve people on site in the right week is often worth more to a main contractor than the rate.
Fire and acoustic performance is where it stops being a finishing trade. A partition rated for sixty minutes is a tested system: a specific board, a specific thickness, a specific fixing centre, specific insulation and a sealed head detail. Substituting any part of it invalidates the rating, and the paperwork proving it was built as specified is part of the deliverable.
This is also the part of the trade where the FIS membership means something, because its membership is weighted towards fit-out contractors rather than the sole traders who do domestic work.
Metal stud partitioning across an office or retail fit-out, one of the jobs a commercial plastering specialist is hired for.
Choosing someone for the job
Ask what the specified finish level is and make sure it is on the drawing rather than in an email. For any rated partition, ask for the system reference and the test evidence rather than a product name. Ask how the contractor resources a programme, because availability in the right week is what the price is actually buying.
Common questions
How is commercial plastering priced?
Per contract, from a drawing and a specification, rather than per room. Rates per square metre exist but they are an input to a tender rather than a quote, because programme and certification usually move the number more than area does.
What makes a partition fire rated?
The whole system: board type and thickness, stud gauge and spacing, fixing centres, insulation and the detail where it meets the slab. The rating comes from a test of that assembly, so changing one component loses it.